Scrap Metal
by VincentBlueRose
Summary: After a local mechanic was hired to rebuild and upgrade the old animatronics, everyone thought everything would be fine. But then the animatronics start malfuntioning, and one of them tries to kill a security guard. Rumours are circulating, and everyone is keeping secrets. As the robots change one by one, fear returns to the restaurant, and no one is safe.
1. Chapter 1

**okay i've edited this so it's a lot less cringey and i fixed some grammar mistakes**

 **and if you're looking for ships this is not the place**

 **also the grammar/punctuation is a lot better in the actual story than in the author's notes i apologize for my laziness**

 **plus it's still pretty cringey in the first ten chapters because the main character was gonna be one of my ocs (cuz i wrote this when i was like twelve) but then it just ended up being golden freddy so idk**

 **enjoy**

 **or don't**

 **Chapter 1**

"TAKE COVER!"

Four security guards dove behind a large control panel in the Parts and Service room. Sparks and bits of metal flew everywhere, bouncing off the walls and hitting the lights.

One of the guards peeked out from behind the control panel. Springtrap was spazzing so violently, its head almost fell off. Bonnie's arms clattered to the floor, and Freddy's legs folded under him and he collapsed. The rest exploded into flying bits of metal.

"Turn it off! Turn it off!" the guard yelled.

Another guard shot to his feet and grabbed a lever on the panel. He yanked it hard, and the shaking animatronics went dormant.

The rest of the guards stood up. One with brown hair and a purple hat that matched his uniform knelt down and picked up a piece of metal. The guard's nametag read "Mike".

He sighed. "Epic failure number twelve."

A blond-haired guard stood and started brushing off his violet suit. "I can't believe we failed _again_."

One with neatly groomed black hair streaked with grey walked around with his arms held in front of him. "Can someone help me find my glasses?"

A redheaded guard was walking around in the same manor. "I can't find mine, either!"

Mike sighed. "Scott, Fritz, we don't have time for this! Jeremy, could you come help me figure out what was wrong with them this time?"

Mike and the blond man started examining the robots while Fritz and Scott wandered around, crashing into walls and tripping over metal.

Jeremy fiddled nervously with the cuffs of his sleeves. "Oh gosh, when Mr. Graves finds out we failed-"

"He won't blame us," Mike interrupted. "He knows how hard it is to create kid-friendly robots that won't try to kill security guards and bite little kids. Right?"

Scott slid his glasses onto his face. "I don't know. You guys know the rumours about him. He supposedly killed five kids in 1987." He tilted his head. "Or was that '83? Okay, I should just look this up or something."

"Whatever happened then," Fritz said, crawling around on the floor, "he's bossy and mean. What do you think he'll do to us if he sees that we've failed?"

Jeremy shuddered. "I don't want to find out."

" _Guys_." Mike held up both hands in an unmistakable "stop" gesture. "We'll be fine. He won't kill us or anything. Everything will be okay."

The door swung open. The guards flinched as a young man with purple hair and a purple security guard outfit slowly walked into the room, both hands in his pockets. Smoke curled from the cigarette in his mouth and wafted through the air, making the guards cough. The man took the cigarette out and blew smoke into the air. He took another step and a crunch echoed through the room. He lifted his foot off the shards of Fritz's glasses and walked closer to Mike and Jeremy.

He tossed his cigarette on the floor behind him and looked around the room. "Hmm. I see it didn't go well."

Mike gulped. "No, it didn't. But we're still trying. Just give us another chance-"

"No," the man interrupted. "You've had twelve chances. We need someone experienced to do this. Otherwise, Freddy Fazbear's will be shut down forever. We can't have Freddy Fazbear's with no Freddy, can we?" Mike and Jeremey shook their head vigourously. The man smiled. "Well, I've found someone who can get these things up and running again. Then we can all have our jobs back." He took a deep breath. "Look, I own this place, and when it burned down the first time, that looked bad for the company. So did the- _rumours_ \- about 1983 and 1987. Then there was the whole Fazbear's Fright thing. And there was the fact that the old animatronics tried to kill security guards and stuff them in Fazbear suits." All the guards but Scott shuddered. "We need to rebuild our reputation, and then you guys can have your jobs back."

"Um…" Mike nervously spoke up. "You said you found someone else to do this. Who is it?"

The man took another cigarette from his pocket. He took a second to light it while the guards stared at him. With the cigarette in his mouth, the man smiled. "Yes, I have in fact, found someone." He reached in his pocket and took out a photo of a girl with dark brown hair standing in front of a garage door that had the words "Supernova Auto Body" painted in green, white, and blue. "This is Zoe Nova. A skilled mechanic who runs an auto body downtown."

Fritz furrowed his eyebrows. "I recognize that name."

"I know her!" Jeremy exclaimed. "Mike and I went to school with her."

The man stuffed the picture back in his pocket. "She was four years old in 1987. Her mother is a businesswoman, and her father is a baker. She was heartbroken when Freddy's was shut down. She'd been hoping that it would be back in business by her thirtieth birthday."

Scott nodded and smiled. "And she'll do anything to get it back, even if it's just for memory's sake. Vincent, you're a genius!"

The man smirked and shrugged. "I guess I am."

Jeremy whipped out his phone. "I think I might still have her number-"

"Hold on," Fritz stood up. "Are we one-hundred percent sure about this?"

Vincent's smile faded. He took his cigarette out of his mouth and stepped closer to Fritz. "Excuse me?" His voice was quiet, but it had an undertone, like _say that again and I'll drive a knife between your eyes._

"Um… I- I mean…" Fritz stuttered. "Ah, I just… Well, I was thinking, do we really need Freddy's to be open again?"

Vincent blew a puff of smoke in Fritz's face, making the guard cough. "We've been trying for over a year to fix these things, and you just start thinking this _now_?"

"Um… yes?"

Vincent stared at Fritz for a second, then backed up again. "I have to admit, you've got nerves, Smith. That's the kind of thing we need in our guards at Freddy's. But never question me again, got it?"

Fritz nodded vigourously. Vincent looked at Jeremy. "Call the girl. Tell her we're trying to restart Freddy's business and we need her help. If she doesn't agree, convince her somehow."

Vincent took one final puff of his cigarette and tossed it on the floor. He left the room, leaving the still lit cigarette smoking on the floor.


	2. Chapter 2

**dying of cringe overload rn as i read over my first version of this chapter**

 **SHOUT OUTS: SoulErrorArwitch (yes, I have overcome my writers' block, and thank you!), FiveNightsAtLuis and JosXgamer for favouriting and following the story, and wdsnoop for following the story!**

 **Chapter 2**

"Fuck no!" Zoe yelled, throwing an empty pop can at the TV. "That was a home run! I saw that with my own two eyes! Come on!"

Zoe sighed, leaning back in her chair and taking another bite of pizza. "Stupid scorekeepers," she muttered with her mouth full of cheese and pepperoni.

She was sitting alone in her small-ish house, watching people play baseball and other people do a terrible job at scorekeeping. She did this a lot. Being the best mechanic in a city had its downsides. She didn't get much free time because people were constantly coming to her to fix things. The only time she had to herself was at night, when she should be sleeping.

But there she was, at one a.m., watching a pre-recorded baseball game while eating pizza, pop, and popcorn.

The game just ended and she was gathering up all her trash, when her phone rang. Zoe dug it out of her pocket and pressed the speakerphone button.

"Hello?" She answered, setting it down on the chair and continuing to pick up garbage.

"Hey, Supernova," a familiar voice said.

The mechanic grinned as she grabbed an old chip bag off the floor beside the TV. "Hey, Jerebear. How's Mickey doing?" She asked, using their old nicknames from high school.

"Eh, he's fine. Except for the fact that our boss is a total control-freak."

She tossed a Pepsi can into the trash. "Really? That must suck for you guys."

A bitter laugh sounded from the other end. "Yeah. He's kinda scary, though, with all these rumours saying that he killed five kids." He took a deep breath. "Okay, I have something I need to ask you," he said in an overly serious tone.

Zoe picked up an empty pizza box from two nights ago. She needed to start cleaning her house more often. "Yeah? What is it?"

"Okay, so, our boss heard about your mechanical skills, and he says you could maybe help us."

She dumped all the garbage she had in her arms into the trash. "Help? With what?"

"Ah, he was thinking that maybe you could help rebuild the animatronics."

Zoe froze just as she was about to pick up and empty chip bag. A shout of joy welled in the back of her throat.

"Don't scream!" Jeremy ordered, and Zoe forced it back. Still, she couldn't help smiling. They wanted her to rebuild the animatronics! Freddy's would be back in business!

"And the boss says you could maybe become an employee, if you want."

This time, she couldn't help yelling at least a little bit.

"Holy _shit_! Are you _serious_? _Me_?"

"Whoa, calm down, Zoe," Jeremy said.

Zoe stopped and took a deep breath. "Okay. I'm calm. So, when do I start?"

"Can you be here at maybe two p.m. tomorrow?"

She glanced at her watch. It was one-thirty in the morning. "Wait, by 'tomorrow', do you mean 'later today'? Or actually tomorrow?"

"I think the sooner the better. Mr. Graves can get pretty impatient."

"Great. See you then." Zoe hung up and went upstairs. If she was going to be rebuilding deadly animatronics, she would need a lot of sleep. She was going to be working hard.

 _ **xXx**_

Zoe walked into the rebuilt restaurant thirteen hours later to the smell of smoke. She coughed and waved her hand in front of her face. Other than the smell, the place looked great. It looked almost exactly like the old pizzeria, but everything was newer. The stage at the far end shined like it was just polished. The tablecloths were a bright white, and the chairs didn't have marker drawings all over them.

Zoe gave a low whistle. "Damn."

Then a man in a purple suit walked into the room, holding a cigarette in one hand and a smile plastered on his face. Zoe grimaced. This was going to be her new boss?

 _Oh well. You can deal with it,_ she thought _. Do it for the memories, and all the kids who will be able to come here when it reopens._

Zoe glued on a polite grin and walked over to the man. "You must be the owner. Jeremy told me about you."

He held out his hand, and Zoe shook it. "Yes. I'm Vincent Graves. So, you must be Zoe Nova." It didn't sound like a question.

She nodded. "Yep. So, what do I do?"

"I thought Jeremy already told you."

"He did, but-"

"Well then, come with me." He started walking back the way he came, and it took her a second to realize she should probably follow him.

They stopped in front of a white door that said "Parts and Service" on it in big black letters. He opened it with one hand took a puff of his cigarette with the other.

Inside was a huge mess. There were bits of metal scattered everywhere. Wires hung off the ceiling, and the control panel in the centre of the room looked kinda beaten up. The only thing holding it together was a crapload of duct tape. There were four people inside, cleaning up the mess.

Zoe stepped in after Vincent. "Wow. This place is totaled."

A brown-haired guy picking up wires at the far end looked up. His face broke into a smile. "Zoe! How's it going?"

Zoe shrugged. "Hey, Mike. Could be better." Then she smiled. "Well, actually, I couldn't be better. I mean, I'm actually here, and I just-" She shrugged. She didn't really have words for how she was feeling right then.

A guy with curly red hair looked at her and squinted. "I can't see her."

Another guard with neat salt-and-pepper hair and glasses clapped the redhead on the shoulder. "We'll get you new glasses, Fritz." Then they looked at her. "So, you're Zoe Nova?"

She nodded. "The one and only."

"Hey, Zoe," Jeremy smiled and waved. She waved back.

Vincent smiled dryly. "So, Zoe, we were thinking that before you started working on designing the animatronics, maybe you could find out what went wrong with our past attempts." He went to the taped control panel and picked up a clipboard. "We know some of what we did wrong, but can't quite figure out what the real problem is," he said, handing the clipboard to her.

Zoe took it with both hands and gazed at the sheet of paper. She read over it and snorted. "Really? My gosh, you guys are terrible mechanics."

"What is it?" Jeremy asked eagerly.

Zoe giggled. "Oh, gosh! This is- god, you guys are like five incredibly drunk men trying to walk in a straight line."

"But what did we do wrong?" Mike asked.

She shook her head, still grinning. "Never mind, never mind. I'll help you guys rebuild the animatronics." She looked at the control panel. "Starting with that."

The black-haired guy tilted his head. "That's not an animatronic," he said, as if she didn't already know that.

She rolled her eyes. "No wonder you guys failed twelve times. To make high-quality robots, you'd need a high quality database."

Fritz shrugged. "This was all we could afford."

Zoe shrugged. "Fair enough, but a good computer or laptop would probably do." She knelt down and picked up a piece of metal in the shape of a bunny's ear. "Hmm."

"What is it?" Mike asked.

Zoe turned the metal over in her hands. "This has nothing to do with your failed attempts, but maybe we could try remaking the animatronics into more- human-looking forms."

The black haired man tilted his head. "What do you mean?"

"What do you think I mean?" She stood up. "Those animatronics were kind of creepy, to be perfectly honest. Maybe it will improve the company's reputation if they were less creepy and more human. I also think that we should change their programming a little so they don't end up trying to kill people in the middle of the night. Unfortunately, I'm not good with technology. I'd need someone who can do coding and stuff to help me with this."

Fritz raised his hand. "I'm good with technology."

Zoe nodded. "Okay then. Fritz and I will work on the animatronics."

"Hold up," Vincent interrupted. "This place is famous for having _animal_ looking animatronics working here. Are we really just going to change that? It won't seem as kid-friendly, will it?"

Zoe stepped closer to him. He was pretty tall, so she had to look up. She hated it when people tried to order her around.

"Who's the mechanic here?" she asked. "Me? Or you?"

Vincent shrugged. "I used to be a pretty good mechanic myself."

" _Used_ to be. Well, Mr. Purple Guy, if we create them with their original programming, they could easily be swayed to murderous. Meaning that they could resort to their old habits of doing what they do best. Being killers. They could go back to biting children and killing security guards, and your restaurant would be closed once again. So, are we going to do this your way, or my way?"

The two stared at each other for a moment, having a silent standoff. Finally, he backed away. "Fine. We'll do it your way."

He inhaled some of his cigarette and left the room in a flurry of smoke.

Zoe looked back at the others. "Is it normal for him to be this bossy?"

The black-haired guy shrugged. "Pretty much. I'm Scott, by the way."

Zoe nodded at him. "Nice to meet you." She looked at the bunny ear in her hand. "Alright. First order of business; let's get this place cleaned up."


	3. Chapter 3

**fuckignkillme**

 **SHOUT OUTS: TheFanficCritic1337 and FiveNightsAtLuis (thanks :D), mjstimpson and for favouriting the story, and eggers for favouriting and following the story!**

 **Chapter 3**

Zoe leaned forward and hit her head on the desk. She was tired. She'd been up all night sketching ideas for the new animatronics. She hadn't gotten any sleep and was exhausted. She wondered if this was what the night guards felt like after staying up until six a.m. Did they just sleep in the daytime, though? That would be cool. They'd be like, vampires or something. But what if they really _were_ vampires? With fangs and the bat-morphing thing and all that? That would be so awesome, because then she would be friends with vampires. But what if they wanted to suck her blood?

She sat up and shook her head. She knew she was staying up too late when she started having thoughts like that.

She sighed and leaned back in her chair, turning her head to glance at the clock. She did a double take. She'd started working at seven (after repairing the control panel), and it was four in the morning.

Zoe had been working for _eleven hours_?! She had no idea how she stayed awake for that long. Usually after a long day of work, she would either collapse in bed or eventually fall asleep while watching a movie or a prerecorded baseball game. Maybe she was so charged with adrenaline from the idea that Freddy's might be open again that she just couldn't sleep.

She hit her head on the table again. Today was going to be a long day.

 _ **xXx**_

She walked into the pizzeria two hours later with a bag full of papers and pencil crayons. That was when Vincent had called for all of them to be there.

When Zoe opened the door to the Parts and Service room, everyone was already there except for Scott. She walked toward the panel and dumped the bag with the papers on it just as the door opened. She looked up and saw Scott rush in. She braced herself for Vincent either yelling or hitting him in the face or something, but all Vincent did was glance up at him and go back to reading his book.

Zoe furrowed her brow. That was unexpected. She didn't dwell too much on it, though. It wasn't her business.

She turned back to her papers. "Hey Fritz," She looked up and motioned him over. "You got new glasses. Good. I want you to take a look at these."

He came over and stood next to her, though he looked confused. "Why? I'm not going to be building them. I don't think I would be able to."

Zoe nodded. "Yeah, I know. That's what _I'm_ here for. But we're working on this together, so I figured maybe you should take a look at these anyway. Besides, I'm going to need you to help me with the whole thing about giving them learning AIs."

Vincent suddenly shot to his feet. "What?"

Jeremy looked up from his tablet. "What?"

Mike fumbled with his newspaper. "What?"

Scott dropped his bright red cell phone. "What?"

Fritz tilted his head. He didn't seem as alarmed as the other guards. "What do you mean, 'learning AIs'?"

She shrugged. She didn't really see what the big fuss was about. "What do you think I meant by 'learning AIs'? I mean, if we're going to make them humane, I figured we should make them as close to humans as we can get. Humans are constantly learning and developing as they grow, and that's what I want for these guys."

Vincent walked toward them, leaving his novel on the chair he was sitting on. "No. Them being humanoid, I can accept. But this? No. That's a definite no. They would be dangerous, possibly even more so than the original animatronics. No. Just no."

"For once, I agree with him," Mike said, folding up his newspaper.

"Yeah." Jeremy nodded, setting down his tablet. "It's just a bad idea. They should just have the programming to know how to do their jobs. That's it."

Zoe decided to keep her idea of them having a "defense mode" in case someone broke into the pizzeria to herself. Instead, she decided to either convince them to go along with this, or be as annoying as possible until they agreed.

"Guys, if they have intelligence of their own, they'll be able to think and act more human. They _definitely_ won't kill anyone this time. Plus, they might be able to communicate better with people, because they'll recognize voices and faces just like we do. Just give it a chance."

Vincent shook his head. "No. Absolutely not. This is a risk we just can't take."

"Look, I was planning on giving them an emergency shut down button in case they do anything violent. It'll be controlled from the control panel, Fritz's laptop, and a remote control that I'll keep with me at all times. Come on. Please?"

"No. Absolutely not."

Zoe crossed her arms and figured that her only chance was to resort to Plan B. "I'm just going to keep staring at you until you agree."

"Fine." Vincent threw his hands in the air and sat back down, burying his nose in his book once again. He held it in front of his face so Zoe couldn't see him, so she glared at the book cover instead.

Two minutes past, and she still kept her eyes on him. Vincent glanced over his book to see if she was still looking and immediately went back to the book when he saw her gaze still fixed on him. She was determined that this would make the robots more friendly and less dangerous than before, and there was no way she was going to give up because of some whiny little twenty-five-year-old.

A few more minutes passed, and he slammed his book shut. "Fine! Do what you want with them! I don't care! Just stop staring at me!"

Zoe grinned. "Took you long enough." She turned back to Fritz. "Anyway, about those designs…"

 **i hate this chapter so fucking much please someone just punch me in the fucking face**


	4. Chapter 4

**what the fcuk was i thinking**

 **SHOUT OUTS: StormCloud666 (YAAAAAAAAAAY)!**

 **Chapter 4**

Zoe took the papers out of her bag and laid them out on the control panel for Fritz to see. "Okay, I made six designs for each bot: two male, two gender-neutral, and two female. And there's a lot of animatronics, so we're going to be here a while."

"I'm hungry," Fritz said.

Zoe looked at him. "Really? Now?"

He shrugged. "Can I go get some doughnuts?"

She sighed in exasperation. "Mike, Jeremy, could one of you go get Fritz some doughnuts?"

"Okay!" Mike and Jeremy said at the same time. They both stood up and ran out the door.

"No, I just said one of- Ah, whatever. Anyway-"

"Do you need me here?" Scott asked.

She tried to contain her annoyance. They wouldn't get anything done if they kept getting interrupted. "No, but-"

"I want some toast," Vincent declared.

Zoe facepalmed. "What? Where did that come from?"

"I'm hungry. I need to eat, too."

She clenched her fists. "Fine. Both of you can go. I don't care."

She sat down in Vincent's now vacant chair and waited for Fritz to finish looking through the drawings. _Some people_ _are so annoying_ , she thought. She loved Jeremy and Mike to death, but they could be so stupid sometimes.

About fifteen minutes later, Mike and Jeremy burst into the room, each carrying a small brown bag with the Tim Hortons logo on it. Mike was laughing and telling annoying jokes while Jeremy was watching something on his phone. Probably anime.

Jeremy tossed his bag to Fritz, who caught it in both hands. "Here you go."

Mike set his bag on top of the papers on the panel and continued rambling to Jeremy.

Zoe rolled her eyes. "Get outta here, you two are distracting."

"Well, _I'm_ not," Jeremy said. "That would be him." He pointed his thumb at Mike, who was still making stupid jokes.

"Hey, why can't a bicycle stand on its own?" Mike asked Jeremy.

"I don't know," Jeremy said absently, looking back down at his phone.

"Because it's two tired! Get it? Cuz it has two tires, and- Oh geez!" He burst out laughing.

Zoe sighed. "You're such a doofus."

"No, no, wait until you hear this one-"

"And now you're leaving," she said, grabbing the backs of both boys' shirts and pushing them out the open door.

"Wait," Mike said. "What do you call cheese that isn't yours?"

"I don't care," she replied loudly.

"Nacho cheese! Get it? Cuz it sounds like-"

"Goodbye!" she yelled, pushing them into the hallway. Zoe turned back to the room and shut the door in Mike's face.

"You're no fun," she heard him mutter.

"GOODBYE," she said louder. She heard Mike and Jeremy walk down the hallway, Mike making puns and jokes the whole way.

She sighed. "Sorry, Fritz. Anyway, what do you think of the designs?"

He shrugged. "I really like them all. You're a great artist."

Zoe smiled. "Thanks. But which ones do you like the most?"

"I've only checked out the Freddy, Bonnie, and Chica ones, and I really like these ones the most." He held up three papers for her to see.

She took them and nodded. "These were actually my favourites, too. Why don't you take a look at the others? I'm gonna go look around. I haven't been here in ages."

He nodded. "Okay."

She opened the door and peeked out, glancing up and down the hallway to make sure Mike didn't jump out and start yelling out stupid jokes.

Fortunately, he wasn't anywhere to be seen. Zoe came out of the room and started exploring.

The place looked so similar to the original. All of the rooms were in the places they were before the fire. Even the furniture was almost in the same places they were in. It was incredible. Someone must've committed every detail of the place to memory.

She went around, opening random doors just to see what was inside and if anything was the same. Pretty much everything was. Then she spotted the silhouette of a door hidden in the design of the wallpaper. It was probably just a storage room, but still, she was curious.

She went up to the door and put her hand on it. She pushed the door open, and she did not expect to see what she did.

On the other side of the door was what looked like a bedroom. There was a bed next to the door. Beside that was a dresser with clothes hanging out of the drawers. A set of closet doors was at the far side of the room. The floor was so covered in stuff, she could barely see it, and the room smelled heavily of smoke. Vincent stood in front of a large mirror that hung next to the closet.

Then she noticed the scars.

White scratches lined his back and curled around his shoulder blades. Some of the scars stuck out as scabs, as though they'd been recently reopened. His arms and the back of his neck were in the same condition.

She looked up at the mirror and saw that he was bandaging a cut on his chest. She squinted and noticed that his face was covered in makeup, maybe to cover up more scars. She blanched. What had happened to him?

Zoe was pretty sure that she wasn't supposed to be seeing this.

Once the blood was cleaned up and the cut was bandaged, Vincent looked at the mirror and quickly twisted his violet hair into a ponytail. Then he froze. It took her a moment to realize that he was looking at her, or at least her reflection.

Zoe panicked and ran away from the door as fast as possible.

 _ **xXx**_

She was lost in her thoughts, so she barely noticed when she entered the Parts and Service room. Fritz heard her come in and turned around in his chair to face her. "Hey Zoe. I'm almost done with the..." His voice trailed off when he saw her face. "Ah, you okay? What happened?"

She simply shook her head and took a deep breath, trying to block out her thoughts. "Nothing. It's fine." She pulled Vincent's chair up next to Fritz and sat down. "So, which ones did you pick?"

"I really liked this Marionette one, and this one for Foxy, Toy Freddy, Toy Foxy, Toy Bonnie, and Toy Chica," he said, holding up the designs as he talked. "I still haven't decided for Springtrap and Balloon Boy though."

"What about the other one?" Zoe asked. He'd left out one animatronic, and she didn't know why.

"Um..." He shrugged. "I don't know. Are you sure you want to replicate that one?"

She nodded. "Why not?"

"Uh, that one was pretty dangerous as an animatronic."

"So what? It won't be the same animatronic now. It won't have the same programming at all."

"You do realize that it bit someone once, right?"

"Of course."

He looked uneasily at the drawing in his hands. The paper held an image of a man with blond hair in an elegant yellow suit with a purple bow tie. His hat was the same colour of his suit. The rest of the designs for the animatronic laid on the control panel.

Fritz heaved a sigh. "Well, if you're sure."

Zoe picked up the designs he already chose. "Great. You decide on the last three, and I'll get started with these."


	5. Chapter 5

**_end my suffering_**

 **SHOUT OUTS: xEnderAwesomex (I'M SORRY I MISSED YOUR PAST REVIEWS [at least I think I did] SO SORRY), SoulErrorArwitch (I have already watched them, cuz who doesn't love Markiplier?), StormCloud666 (it might be Fredbear, it might be Golden Freddy, who knows I don't know it can be both), TheFanficCritic (I DON'TKNOW WHY YOU'RE USING SO MUCH CAPS LOCK AND NOT GRAMMARING GOOD), and Scarlet Firesong for following and favouriting me and the story!**

 **Chapter 5**

"LUNCH BREAK!"

Zoe stepped away from the pile of materials she'd bought for making the animatronics. She had started making the frames for some of the robots and was already tired.

Fritz set his laptop down on the control panel. "Come on! I'm hungry!"

He dashed out the door and Zoe walked calmly behind him. Fritz sure got excited easily when it came to food.

Everyone stood in the dining hall, waiting for Zoe and Fritz. Scott was talking on his phone, Mike was trying to tell Jeremy jokes, Jeremy was not listening to Mike and watching anime on his phone, and Vincent was standing uncomfortably nearby. He didn't meet Zoe's eyes as she walked in.

Vincent nodded. "Okay, so you all know the drill. Go to whatever place you want to, get your food, and be back here in an hour."

Mike whooped. "I'm going to A&W!"

"McDONALD'S!" Fritz and Jeremy cheered together.

Scott looked at Zoe and Vincent. "You guys wanna come to Subway with me?"

She shook her head. "Nah, I'm going to DQ," she said at the same time Vincent said "No, I'll just go to Dairy Queen."

They looked at each other. "Uh, I'll actually go to Subway with Scott," he said.

Zoe shook her head. "No, it's fine. Stop being so nervous. It's not like I'm going to kill you or something," Zoe said. She wanted to ask him about those scars, and this might be the only chance she would get.

They had a silent standoff, then he sighed. "Fine."

Scott stared at them. "Well, that was weird."

"Oh well, let's go, I'm hungry!" Fritz whined.

They all walked out of the pizzeria and went their separate ways. Vincent kept as far away from Zoe as possible as she made her way toward her blue pickup truck parked in front of the sidewalk. She fished a keyring out of her pocket and unlocked the truck.

She got in the driver's side and looked out at him. "You coming?"

He shrugged. "I think I'll just walk."

Zoe started to get out. "I'll walk with you."

He shook his head. "It's fine."

Zoe crossed her arms. "Listen, I just want to know about those scars."

He glared at her. "That's not any of your business," he growled.

"That doesn't stop me from wanting to know."

He raised an eyebrow. "You're not intimidated easily, are you?"

"Nope." If someone else had given him those scars, he had to tell someone, whether he wanted to or not. Hurting someone like that was bad. She would know.

Vincent sighed. "Fine, we'll walk." He started walking, and Zoe scrambled out of the vehicle to catch up.

They walked in awkward silence for a few minutes. Then she couldn't bear the silence anymore. "What are all those scars from?"

"An accident," was his only answer.

"Like, what kind of accident? A car accident?" She pressed on. He was lying, or at least not telling the whole truth. She could tell.

He shook his head. "Not exactly."

"Come on, dude. I need answers."

"Don't call me 'dude'." He glowered at her.

She shook her head. "Oh well. Deal with it. And stop acting so distant and creepy. Do you want people to be scared of you your whole life?"

"I don't see what's wrong with that."

"Maybe you should try caring about people more."

"Why should I?"

"Because then people will care about you."

"I don't need to care about anyone."

"But people will care about you, though. Do you actually care about someone?"

"No."

"Come on. Someone. Anyone."

" _I_ _don't_ _care_ _about_ _anyone_."

"I think you do."

" _Shut_ _up."_

"Not until you-"

"Fine!" He sighed. "Scott."

"And why do you care about Scott?"

"He saved my life."

"How did he save your life?"

Vincent glowered at her. "I'm not telling you."

"Why not?"

"Because I don't want to!" He shoved his hands in his pockets and looked away.

"Vincent, I'm serious. You should tell someone. You might feel better."

"I feel fine," he snarled. "And don't call me 'Vincent'."

"You're not fine," she protested. "I've said that enough times to know if it's a lie or not."

"We're here."

She looked up where he was pointing. They had arrived at Dairy Queen.

Zoe sighed and glared at him. "We're not done with this."

 _ **xXx**_

Once they were all back at the pizzeria and had finished their food, Vincent walked toward the room he'd been in when Zoe accidentally saw his scars. "Back to work, gentlemen. And young lady," he added, looking at Zoe. He seemed to have trouble getting out the last two words.

Mike and Jeremy each shot Zoe a quick smile and ran to the back of the restaurant towards the security guard room. Scott opened the door to the backstage. She had no idea what those guys' jobs were, but they weren't her concern.

Fritz and Zoe walked back to the Parts and Service room. Once they got there, she turned to Fritz. "Okay, you start working on the programming. I'll start building."

He nodded. "Okay." He sat down in the chair at the control panel and booted up his laptop. He plugged the computer into to the panel and began working.

Zoe turned and looked at the empty animatronic frames, then down at the heap of metal she had collected from the guards' past failed attempts. She picked up an ear-shaped piece of pink and white metal from the Toy Foxy robot. She'd taken to calling it Mangle, since that was what a lot of people had called the old Toy Foxy robot before the fire.

She bent over and picked up her toolbox, then looked back up at the metal frames. Her thoughts whirled around in her brain, half her mind wondering about what accident Vincent might have been in, the other wanting to concentrate on the task at hand.

She took a deep breath and began to build.


	6. Chapter 6

**mangle is going to be a boy in this story and the marionette and springtrap will be girls don't rage at me in the reviews please**

 **but if multiple people get annoyed about mangle's gender and say that he's a girl, then I can go back and change it so that he's genderfluid or bigender, and that way, he can kind of be both, therefore (hopefully) satisfying everyone**

 **SHOUT OUTS: The Derpy Fox (thx :D), xEnderAwesomex (I _do_ reply to the reviews. That's what the shout outs are here for!), Scarlet Firesong (YAY MARKIPLIER), and The DJ Absolution for following the story.**

 **Chapter 6**

 ***One month later***

Zoe tied Golden Freddy's purple bow tie and stepped back from the dormant robots.

They were finished.

It had taken a lot of work, and a heck of a lot of time, but she had finally recollected each of the animatronics into a more human form. Her chest swelled with pride as she stared at them. She had made these with her own two hands.

Fritz walked up behind her. "Whoa. Those look awesome."

She smiled. "Thanks. Have you got the programming done?"

He nodded and went back to the control panel. "Almost. But are you still sure about giving them learning AIs?"

"One hundred percent."

He took a deep breath. "Okay. Here goes nothing." He hit a few keys on his laptop, then looked up again. "They should be active in a few seconds."

The two of them stood and watched the robots. For about fifteen awkwardly silent seconds, nothing happened, and Zoe began to worry that maybe they did something wrong.

Then the jumper cables protruding from the control panel that were connected to the robots' hands sparked, and an electric current flowed through the wires, jarring the animatronics. They twitched violently as the electricity jolted through their circuits.

The lights flickered in the room and all the power in the building went out. Zoe heard a crashing noise as the robots were jarred loose from their stands and toppled over.

"OH, COME ON!" an angry Vincent yelled from the dining room. Zoe heard Jeremy shriek in fear (from the power outage or Vincent's screaming, she wasn't sure). Footsteps approached the door to the room, and the door swung open. Mike walked in, his face illuminated from the flashlight on his phone.

"What happened?" he asked.

Zoe shrugged, her spirits sinking. "I guess it didn't work. There wasn't enough power to activate them all."

Mike sighed. "That's too bad. Maybe we can try again."

Fritz shook his head. "There's not enough power in the entire pizzeria to activate them. It won't work."

Suddenly, Zoe heard something move in the corner of the room. "Everybody be quiet!" she ordered. The other two looked at her.

"What is it?" Fritz asked.

"I think I heard something."

Mike swung the flashlight across the whole room. "I don't see anything."

He pointed his flashlight in the corner Zoe had heard the noise in. The Toy Bonnie robot was there, not moving at all. His eyes were still closed.

Suddenly, he twitched, and the cables on his hands sparked. His eyes shot open.

Zoe looked around. All of the other animatronics were doing the same. It was a little creepy, seeing human looking bodies twitching on the floor, but she smiled. It _had_ worked.

Fritz cheered. "YES!"

"That's what I'm talkin' about!" Mike yelled.

Mike and Zoe exchanged high-fives and Fritz decided to use his phone to order a celebratory pizza, while the robots looked at them in confusion. The three unclipped the cables from their hands and they stared around the room blankly.

"Keep it down in there!" Vincent complained. He appeared in the doorway and gaped at them. "Oh my gosh..."

Zoe looked down at the Freddy robot. He was trying to get to his feet, but failing miserably. Zoe laughed. "Here, I'll help." She grabbed his arm and hoisted him up. He almost fell over again, but Fritz took his other arm and they held him up together.

Freddy shook his head, the brown metal fibers for his hair swishing with the movement. He opened his mouth as though he were about to talk, but all that came out was a kind of garbled noise that a baby would make.

"I don't think they can work in the pizzeria for a while," Zoe pointed out. "Right now, they have the intelligence of newborns, even though they mostly have the physical abilities of twenty-year-olds. Their minds are going to have to adjust."

Jeremy entered the room and almost tripped over the Marionette's legs. "Oh geez!" he yelped as he almost landed on his face.

Scott walked in and stepped neatly over the metal girl. He looked around the room in surprise. "Wow. Just wow."

Vincent nodded. "Impressive," he commented as he gave Bonnie a quick once-over. "These are very well made. Well done, Nova."

Zoe looked into Freddy's blue eyes. "Hey, buddy. My name is Zoe. Can you say 'Zoe?'"

He tilted his head, his black top hat almost falling off. "Zzz... Zeh... Zuh..."

She shrugged and reached up to straighten his hat. "Close enough."

"Hey, guys?" Fritz interrupted. "Do any of you want mushrooms on your pizza?"

"Pizza," said a voice next to the control panel. Everyone turned to look at whoever spoke. It was Chica. She looked kind of like a large toddler in her knee-length yellow dress that poofed out at the sleeves. The apron over the dress had the words "Let's Eat!" printed in purple and yellow.

Zoe smiled. She felt like a mom hearing her baby say its first words, which she supposed she kind of was.

She looked down at Toy Chica, who was sitting at her feet. She stared up at her with startling purple eyes that matched Chica's. "I think we need to give the Toys proper names," Zoe said. "Calling them Toy Freddy and Toy Chica all the time doesn't seem right. They have their own minds. They deserve to have names of their own, too."

"Should we change Mangle's name?" Jeremy asked. "I don't know if parents will like their kids being with a a robot named Mangle."

Zoe shrugged. "I don't know. I'm kind of used to calling him that. But the others definitely need names."

"Let's just call them Toy whatever for now," Mike suggested. He bent down to look at Toy Freddy. "Can you say 'Toy Freddy?'"

Toy Freddy blinked in confusion. "To- T- Te- Teddy?"

Zoe laughed. "That's perfect! His name can be Teddy!"

"And Toy Bonnie can be Tonnie!" Fritz exclaimed.

"What about Toy Chica?" Mike asked.

Zoe thought about it for a moment. "Tia could work." She looked down and saw the newly named Tia grinning happily at her. She grinned back.

"Where are they going to sleep tonight?" Vincent asked. "We don't anywhere for them to stay."

Zoe shrugged. "I can bring some blankets, pillows, and sleeping bags from my house. They can sleep in the kitchen for now until we can organize somewhere else for them to stay."

Springtrap stood up. She tugged on her baggy greenish-yellow sweater and fixed her gaze on Vincent. "Purple," she said simply.

Vincent tugged on the collar of his violet uniform. "Um, yeah. Okay."

She tilted her head. "Purple."

Vincent cringed. "Please stop staring at me."

Zoe furrowed her brow. Vincent looked nervous. He was _never_ nervous.

Suddenly, Vincent yelped and jumped backwards. Balloon Boy had scooted over to his feet. BB had been smiling at him, but his grin turned into a frown as the owner of the pizzeria backed away so his back was pressed against the wall.

BB pouted. Zoe knelt down and put an arm around his shoulders while glaring at Vincent. "Come on. Give them a chance. They're not going to hurt you."

Vincent started shaking. "I-I've got to- to g-go. B-bye." He turned around and dashed out the open door. His footsteps faded as he ran away.

"What's up with him?" Mike wondered.

Zoe narrowed her eyes. Maybe it was time she found out.

Zoe gave BB a quick kiss on the forehead and got up. "I'll go talk to him," she announced, walking towards the door. "You guys can show them around the place, but make sure they don't break anything."

She heard a crash and whirled around. Fritz's laptop was on the floor and the screen was cracked. Bonnie and Teddy were sitting next to it and they both giggled.

Fritz's eyes widened. "My computer!"

Zoe stepped out of the room and wandered through the darkness.


	7. Chapter 7

**SHOUT OUTS: xEnderAwesomex (that's what I was going for :D), SoulErrorArwitch (well, it's proven in the game that Mangle and the Puppet are the genders I made them to be [Phone Guy refers to them as "he" and "she" in his messages] and I just wanted Springtrap and Toy Bonnie to be a girl and a boy. Plus thanks for reminding me about Foxy, I actually forgot about him in the last chapter), BlueMoon37 for favouriting and following the story, and Hutcchy and Black-Kat012 for following the story!**

 **Chapter 7**

"Um, what do we do with them?" Jeremy asked, staring at the robots. They were stumbling around, not doing much of anything.

It was really weird seeing a bunch of twenty year-olds (minus Balloon Boy and the Toys, BB looked about ten and the Toys looked about fifteen), acting like children. Foxy ran around the room in his long black coat, jumping at the others and yelling "YAAAAAR!" at random, Mangle running behind him and screaming for no reason. Mangle was wearing a pink cape over his loose white shirt and brown pants, his black boots clomping on the floor and his long pink hair trailing behind him as he ran. Tia was giving everyone hugs. She was almost fell on her face twice while walking. Teddy was sitting on the floor, his black pants getting covered in dust. He adjusted his orange jacket and continued stare blankly around the room. The Marionette was running around in her black vest and pants and white shirt. She had a little tie around her neck, and it became more untied with each step she took.

The two Bonnies were acting the weirdest though. Tonnie was randomly jumping up and down. His blue vest and long blue hair flopped with each jump, and he was shrieking for no reason. Bonnie was dressed similarly to Teddy, with an open jacket and black clothes underneath. The only differences were the colour scheme (his was purple instead of orange), the red glasses perched on Bonnie's nose, and the red bowtie around his neck. He was spinning in circles and letting out a high-pitched squeal as he did so.

Mike and Jeremy exchanged a glance. Neither had no idea what to do.

Scott apparently decided to give it a shot. He smiled at the bots. "Hey! Who wants to come with me to the dining room?"

Freddy laughed. The sound was deep and smooth, not matching his current behavior at all. He fiddled with the edge of his brown waistcoat and stopped laughing as he got distracted by Mangle's long hair. He reached out to touch it, but Mangle swatted his hand away.

"Come on," Scott coaxed. He glanced at Mike for help.

The said guard shrugged. "Don't ask me. I don't know anything about kids."

"Guys, the pizza's here," Fritz announced, walking into the room. "It's in the dining room if you want any."

"Pizza!" Chica piped up. She got to her feet and ran, stumbling on her way towards the door.

Freddy squealed and ran after her. Bonnie, Foxy, Tia, Teddy, and the Marionette ran after them. The others made various baby noises and went out as well when they noticed their friends leaving.

Scott nodded with satisfaction. "Okay, so they're in the dining room. What do we do now? The power's still out."

Jeremy shrugged as they walked into the dining room. "I have no idea."

They reached the dining room and were greeted by a slightly terrifying, slightly hilarious sight.

Freddy was running around the tables, his eyes glowing, his laugh as well as a song emitting from his mouth. Tonnie and Foxy were laughing and running with him. Mike had never thought he would hear that song again, but apparently he was wrong. It was the Toreador March, the song the original Freddy would play when the power went out.

Fritz looked a little freaked out, but he and Chica gulped down pieces of pizza like there was nothing wrong. Mike had no idea how Chica was eating, being a robot and all, but he decided he didn't want to know. If he asked Zoe, she would probably tell him how they digested and got rid of the food, and he really didn't want to talk about that.

"Should we go get Vincent and Zoe?" Jeremy asked Scott. Scott was the assistant manager, so whenever Vincent wasn't around, he was supposed to be in charge.

Scott shrugged. "Sure. I don't know what else to do."

Mike and Jeremy wandered off to find them.

 _ **xXx**_

Zoe slowly opened the door to Vincent's room, looking around to try to see where he was in the darkness. There were no windows in the room, so it was darker than it was in the hallways. "Vincent?" she called quietly. "Hey, where are you?"

The only response she got was a loud sigh. She was hit with a burst of smoke, and she crinkled her nose and tried to refrain from coughing.

She walked into the room. "Hey, dude. You were acting really jumpy back there. What happened?"

"Nothing. Go away."

Well, at least he was speaking to her. That was progress.

"Just tell me. It was something to do with Springtrap, doesn't it? You looked terrified when she was looking at you."

" _Get out."_

"No."

Zoe heard the rustle of blankets and she turned on her phone flashlight. He'd covered his head with the covers like a little kid hiding from monsters in the dark. All she could see was a giant lump of blankets on the bed. He'd dropped his cigarette on the floor beside the bed.

She sighed. "You have to stop hiding. For the entire month I've been here, you've barely talked to anyone. Are you having, like, family troubles or something?"

"I don't have a family."

She took a second to think. "Uh, money problems?"

"No."

"Depression?"

"I don't know."

"You ran out of toast?"

He stuck out his arm and pointed to a toaster and a bunch of bread on a table on the other side of the room.

"Okay, um… none of those have to do with Springtrap anyway, so… Bad memories at the pizzeria, maybe?"

He stayed silent. _Bingo._

She opened her mouth to question him about what it might be, but then Freddy burst into the room. His eyes were glowing and music was coming from him like he was a human music box.

Zoe grinned and rubbed the top of his fuzzy head. "Hey buddy! What are you doing here?"

He laughed. "Zoe!"

"Did you come to find me?"

"Zoe!"

She smiled. "That doesn't answer my question, but whatever."

Mike and Jeremy appeared behind him. "Hey Zoe, can you help us with them?" Mike gestured at Freddy. "We have no idea how to calm them down."

She nodded. "I'll be there in a second. I just- Wait, Freddy, stop," she said as Freddy started to move towards Vincent, who was peeking out from under the covers to see what was going on. "Let's just leave him alone for now, okay?"

"Purple," Freddy insisted, pouting.

She shook her head. "No, we can't go see Purple right now. He's busy being grumpy."

"Um, Zoe?" Jeremy spoke up. "Why is Freddy doing the song thing with the glowing eyes? It's pretty freaky."

Zoe shrugged. "I did put flashlights into their eyes in case they ever needed to see in the dark. I don't know what's with the music, though. Maybe Fritz did it."

"Could we get the power back on so he'll stop?" Mike asked nervously.

As Zoe walked back to the Parts and Service room, she glanced back inside Vincent's room. He'd tugged the covers back down, and she could clearly see the scars etched into the skin on his face.


	8. Chapter 8

**SHOUT OUTS: frozem1 (thank you!), StormCloud666 (NO NOT TELLING YOU ANYTHING), xEnderAwesomex (no, I would _NEVER_ pair Springtrap with Vincent), and AVFireBlade9472 for favouriting the story!**

 **Chapter 8**

Zoe kissed the top of Tonnie's head. "Goodnight, guys. "

Tia pouted. "Do we hafta sleep?"

Zoe crossed her arms and nodded. "Yep. See you all tomorrow morning."

She walked out and looked into the kitchen as she closed the door. Freddy, Tonnie, and Mangle were already snuggled up in their sleeping bags and snoring away. The Marionette (or Mari, as Zoe had decided to call her) and Golden Freddy (whom she chosen to call "Goldie") were kind of half asleep. The rest were wide awake. As soon as Zoe closed the door, she heard footsteps as someone got out of bed, followed by muffled giggled. She opened the door again, and they all scrambled back to their beds.

Zoe smiled. "Go to sleep, kiddos."

She closed the door again, knowing that they were probably not going to sleep at all.

It was seven o'clock right now, and the animatronics' intellect had grown a lot quicker than she thought they would. Over the course of six hours, they'd seemed to grow six years. They were capable of talking, running, and Mangle had almost done a cartwheel by dinner (except he kind of fell over halfway through).

She walked out of the pizzeria, hopped into her truck, and sped home. She was exhausted after looking after the robots, and she needed to get some sleep.

 _ **xXx**_

 _Freddy opened his eyes and looked around. He was in a large room, on a stage. He looked to his left with effort and saw a large, yellow, chicken-like creature. He wasn't sure how he knew it was a chicken, since he didn't think he'd ever seen one before. He turned to the right and saw a purple bunny thing with a bright red and white guitar in its hands._

 _Freddy looked down at himself. His once human limbs weren't there. He instead saw large, light brown, fat sausages with weird paws on the ends. He tried to move them and was greeted by the loud noise of grinding metal._

 _His head felt heavy, but he managed to lift it enough to look around the room. The floor was black and white checkered and the walls were a depressing shade of grey. Tables were lined up on the floor, and paper plates and party hats littered the ground. Freddy lifted his foot and almost fell over. He regained his balance and tried to take a deep breath. Unfortunately, he had no lungs, mechanical or not._

 _He heard footsteps and turned his head. The bunny was walking away from the stage. He disappeared around a corner, and soon after he was gone, Freddy heard a weird sound- like static, kind of, but more... high pitched, maybe? He wasn't sure what it sounded like. He was curious, but wasn't sure what he should do._

 _He turned again and saw the chicken walking off the stage as well. It went after the bunny, and the same sound emitted from around the corner. Another sound came from a side room, and Freddy whipped around to see a fox-like thing walking there as well._

 _The same thing happened, and Freddy's curiosity finally won over. He clomped off the stage and slowly made his way to the corner. Then he heard something he hadn't before- a low, scratchy voice saying the words "Follow me."_

 _Freddy hesitated. He didn't see where the bunny, fox, and chicken had gone, and was starting to get worried. The voice repeated itself, and he reluctantly followed it. He turned around another corner, and all he saw was a flash of purple, and all he heard was the static-y noise. All he saw was black for a few seconds, and then he was suddenly standing in front of a man all dressed in violet. Even his eyes were purple. The man looked scared, terrified even. Freddy couldn't help but think that he'd seen the man somewhere._

 _Freddy looked down and saw that he was in his old human form, just smaller, like a child. He looked around and saw that he was standing in the middle of four figures- two on his left, two on his right. They were kind of transparent, so he could see the grey walls through them. Freddy turned back to the man, and drifted forward. The other ghosts followed suit, and together, the five spirits advanced on the man, backing him up to a wall. The man looked around frantically, and dashed off to the side, towards a weird yellow robot resembling a bunny._

 _Suddenly, screams filled Freddy's ears, and flames danced across his vision._

Freddy, Bonnie, Chica, Foxy, and Goldie all shrieked at once and bolted upright in their sleeping bags.

 _ **xXx**_

Zoe walked into the pizzeria the next day feeling refreshed and well rested, only to have five terrified animatronics run at her and crush her in a huge group hug.

She almost fell over from the force, but she managed to stay upright. "Hey guys. What's wrong?"

Foxy took a shaky breath. "W-we h-h-had-d a n-ni-nigh-ight-m-m-ma-mar-re," he stuttered. He must've been really scared if he was stammering this much.

She opened her arms and tried to get them all in the hug. "Really? Wow. I'm so sorry, guys."

Goldie stared at her with panicked eyes. "Is this g-going to happen e-every night?"

She shook her head. "No. It's just surprising that you had a nightmare when you haven't seen anything in the world that should scare you. And all five of you at once?"

Bonnie nodded. "Yeah."

She thought for a moment. "How about we all go get some pizza? Would that help?"

Chica perked up when she heard this. "Pizza?"

Bonnie cheered and ran off to the kitchen, followed by Chica, Goldie, and Foxy. Freddy was about to go after them, but then he stopped. "Zoe?"

"Yeah?"

"Um..." He scuffed his shoe on the floor. "What causes nightmares?"

Zoe shrugged. "I'm not sure. I'm not good with organic life forms."

"What?"

"Never mind. But I think it's usually past experiences that you didn't like, like embarrassing things, sad memories, scary things that have happened, things that you feel guilty about- There are so many reasons."

Freddy considered this. "Could it be because you did something that scared yourself, and maybe you regret doing it?"

She thought about, then nodded. "Probably. But that couldn't be reason for you, could it? I mean you haven't done anything, right?"

He shrugged. "I guess I haven't." He turned around and walked to the kitchen.

 **i want to slap 2014 me in the face**


	9. Chapter 9

**SHOUT OUTS: frozem1 (thanks :D), AVFireBlade9472 (okay, as FREAKING AWESOME as that would be, no, Zoe is not a robot), Transformers' BABY for following and favouriting the story, and tmntwolf-lover5 for favouriting the story!**

 **Chapter 9**

Vincent grimaced as he made his way towards his room. Blood was soaking through the sleeve on his right arm, and he did his best to cover it with his other hand. He couldn't have Zoe coming by and questioning him about it. That girl was way too curious.

At least the pain kept his mind off the nightmare he had that night.

He turned a corner and accidentally hit his forehead on something. He heard a strangled yelp and stumbled backwards, trying to see what he bumped into. He was sure there wasn't a wall there, but the thing definitely felt harder than someone's skull.

He growled. "What the f-" Vincent stopped and backed away when he saw a pair of gleaming blue eyes. He looked the person up and down, taking in their brown waistcoat and the black top hat on their head. "W-why are y-you-"

"Sorry! Sorry!" Freddy apologized frantically, rubbing his metal head. "Sorry, I didn't see you, I was just going for a walk, and I-" His voice trailed off when he saw Vincent's arm. The restaurant owner had taken his hand off his arm and put it to his head instead, exposing the blood-soaked uniform. Freddy tilted his head. "Um, what's-"

"Nothing!" Vincent blurted. "Um, I-I have to- to go, uh, bye..." He ran around the robot and dashed down the hallway, pushing open the door to his room and locked it behind him. He took a deep breath, and accidentally dropped the key when he heard his toaster in the corner of the room pop. He whirled around and gave a small shriek. Tonnie and Mangle stood there, laughing at the noise it had made.

"Let's do that again!" Tonnie said eagerly, pushing the button down again.

Vincent opened the door and ran out, not caring if anyone saw his bleeding arm. He burst into the Parts and Service room, startling Zoe and Fritz, who were working out some kind of programming thing. He glared at Zoe. "You have some explaining to do."

 _ **xXx**_

Fritz bit down on a doughnut. He and Zoe sat next to each other in front of the control panel, him tapping seemingly random keys on his keyboard, Zoe kind of half listening to what he was saying.

"So, if their current programming takes up that much data, then we would still have a lot more data to make some upgrades," he said, his words slightly muffled from the food in his mouth. "Not that they need them anytime soon, but it's still a possibility-"

The door suddenly swung open and Fritz and Zoe both startled as it banged against the wall. She whipped her head around to see Vincent standing in the doorway, blood leaking from his arm. The look on his face was an equal mix between fear and rage. His blue eyes were narrowed at Zoe. "You have some explaining to do," he snarled.

Zoe normally wasn't scared of her boss, but this was definitely an exception. With the blood and the angry glare, he looked kind of like he killed someone. Fritz adjusted his chair so he was hiding behind Zoe. She could feel him trembling in his seat.

Zoe laughed nervously. "What do you mean?" she asked Vincent. She had no idea what he was talking about.

He growled. "I went to go into my room, and I found two of those- those freaky little _things_ that you created. Did you make them go in there?"

Zoe shook her head. "No. Why would I?"

"Because you seem to be quite obsessed with the fact that I have secrets that you maybe don't know about. And even if I do, it is _not_ your business, it is _mine_. So _leave me alone, already!_ " He stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

Fritz sighed in relief. "Gosh, I'm _so_ glad he wasn't mad at me."

Zoe raised an eyebrow. "Why would he be mad at you?"

He shrugged. "He could get mad over literally anything and everything. On a bad day, if you so much as breath too loud, he could snap and lower your pay rate, or fire you."

Zoe rolled her eyes. "That sounds highly exaggerated."

He shrugged. "Kinda accurate though. But he doesn't usually go into a blind rage like this. He's normally really calm, but angry at the same time, and it's really creepy. Then he just kinda explodes. It's fucking scary. I wonder what you did to make him so mad."

Zoe stared at the door. "I don't know."

 _ **xXx**_

Freddy had just decided to go for a walk and explore his new home to get his mind off the nightmare when he'd run into the guy in purple. He had no idea what he did to make the purple guy so scared. Was the man scared of robots or something? Maybe he was jumpy because he'd had a nightmare last night, too.

Nightmare...

A wire sparked in Freddy's mechanical brain. That purple guy was the person from Freddy's nightmare. He remembered the flash of purple he'd seen right before everything went black, and the man running towards the golden bunny suit.

Could some dreams be linked somehow? Like, some people have the same dream, but from different perspectives? It had happened with him, Chica, Foxy, Bonnie, and Goldie, but he just assumed that maybe it was just a glitch in their programming. He didn't think it could've stretched all the way to a real person's mind.

But maybe he'd been wrong.

 _ **xXx**_

Chica opened the oven and whisked a large cheese pizza out the opening. She set it gently on the counter and surveyed hers and Tia's work. Two cheese pizzas, two pepperoni, one Hawaiian, and one ham and sausage pizza sat on the counter top, arranged in a neat line.

It was pretty early in the morning for lunch, but after Chica's nightmare, she thought pizza would be good for her. Especially after those voices had started talking to her. Then she and Tia got carried away with the pizza making, and they ended up making enough food to feed everyone in the pizzeria. Neither girl had ever been taught how to make pizza. They just kind of brought out whatever ingredients their programming told them to use, and just kind of let it happen.

Tia dashed to the doors and pushed them open. "ANYBODY WANT PIZZA?" she shouted, her voice reverberating through the restaurant.

A couple seconds later, Fritz tumbled through the doors and scrambled to his feet. "Somebody say pizza?"

Chica picked up a paper plate and held it out to him. "Just be careful, it's still a bit hot."

Fritz grinned and started piling pizza onto his plate as Zoe, Mike, and Jeremy filed into the room. Zoe smiled. "Wow, it smells great, girls."

Tia held out three plates. "Well, it tastes even better. Eat up!"

Eventually, everyone ended up in the kitchen, not bothering to go sit in the dining room. Tonnie and Mangle were grinning ear to ear, chattering about toasters. Mari, Goldie, BB, and Springtrap came in, listening intently to a story Foxy was telling them. Bonnie and Teddy were among the last to get there. They both ran in laughing and yelling for no reason.

Freddy was the very last one to arrive. He looked shocked and slightly confused, as though he'd seen a ghost or something. Chica walked over to him, holding a plate of food. "Hey Freddy. Want some pizza?" she offered.

He furrowed his eyebrows. "Chica? Do you know who that guy from our nightmare was?"

The robotic girl was taken aback by this question. She was trying to forget about that, not talk about it. "No, I don't. Freddy, can't we just forget about this?"

He took a deep breath. "I just- Well, I think the guy from the dream is that guy in purple-"

"Yo mean, Mr. Graves?"

"Yeah. He's really nervous around us, not to mention that he looks just like the guy from our dream."

Chica blinked. The plate of pizza fell from her hands, and she turned around. "Foxy? Bonnie? Goldie? We have to talk to you about something."


	10. Chapter 10

**i hate my past self so fuckin much**

 **SHOUT OUTS: frozem1 (thanks again), Sailor-Yolo (first of all, thanks! Second, I don't know who Strahberri is, but I'll be sure to check out their stories!), HunterHero179 (not really, I'm the author and I'm pretty confused about this fic too), Fate12343, mlp brony fifer, cupcakes and cream, and jleadly9 for favouriting and following the story, and patriciahodnett for following the story!**

 **Chapter 10**

Scott wandered through the halls, carrying a paper plate with pizza in his hands. Vincent hadn't shown up to Chica's and Tia's mini pizza party, and Scott wanted Vincent to see how well the animatronics were progressing (plus, the pizza was absolutely heavenly, and Scott didn't want him to miss out on it).

Scott turned down a random hallway, trying to find where Vincent might be. "Hey, Vincent? I've got pizza!" he called. "Where are you?"

He saw a something move at the end of the short hall and heard a loud, frustrated sigh. Scott made his way down the corridor and found a figure dressed in all purple curled up in a ball. The right sleeve of the man's uniform was stained red with blood. Scott sat down next to his friend and held out the plate. "Hey. I brought you some pizza. It's a bit cold, but it's still good."

Vincent looked up and shook his head. "No thanks. I don't want any."

Scott set the pizza down on Vincent's feet and pointed at it. "Eat it. You'll thank me."

Vincent rolled his eyes and picked up the plate. "Fine." He took a bite of the pizza. "Happy?" he asked through a mouth full of food. The his eyes widened and he looked down at the pizza. "Whoa, this is good."

Scott smiled. "Told you so. Chica and Tia made it."

Vincent swallowed the pizza in his mouth and grimaced, setting the plate down. "I'm not hungry."

The security guard tilted his head. "What's wrong? Hurting again?"

"Yeah."

"Me too, actually."

"At least it's only your back," Vincent scoffed. "I hurt everywhere."

Scott nodded. "Yeah, I guess." His paused. "Those stupid animatronics..." He looked up at the outline of the door Vincent was leaning against. "Why are you out here instead of in there?"

"Mangle and Tonnie were in there and I accidentally locked myself out," he explained. "I dropped my keys in there by accident."

Scott dug around in his pocket and brought out his own set of keys. "I don't seem to have one that would open it... Maybe you could try to pick the lock?"

"Don't know how."

"We could ask Zoe. She might know how."

"I'd rather not."

Scott got to his feet and offered a hand to Vincent. "Come on, let's go see what the others are doing. We'll get that fixed up first though," he said, nodding at the wound on Vincent's arm.

Vincent hesitated, then reluctantly grabbed his hand and stood up with a lot of effort and help from Scott. "Fine."

 _ **xXx**_

"You guys wanna hear a joke about pizza?"

 _"Shut up, Mike."_

"Never mind, it's too- _cheesy!_ "

Zoe looked across the room at Mangle and Tonnie. "Help me," she mouthed. They both giggled and continued eating their pizza.

Jeremy and Zoe exchanged a glance. Mike was going to kill them with those stupid puns and jokes.

"What's the difference between a Mel Gibson movie and pizza? Pizzas are good!"

Jeremy slapped his forehead. "I don't even know who Mel Gibson is."

Mike huffed. "You guys need to get a sense of humor."

Zoe sighed. "Mike, I think _you're_ the one who needs to get a sense of humor."

Mike rolled his eyes. "Come on, those jokes are hilarious. Don't even try to deny it."

Zoe raised an eyebrow. "You really- Okay, I'm done." She set her half-eaten pizza on the counter and walked towards the door.

"Don't leave me alone with him!" Jeremy called after her.

She looked back and fake sniffled. "I'm so very sorry, Jeremy Fitzgerald. You will forever reside in my memory." Zoe ran out of the room.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" She heard Jeremy scream dramatically from the kitchen, along with the laughs of the animatronics as they watched their little scene.

Zoe laughed and walked back into the room. "Okay, fine. But just because that pizza is delicious," she said, making her way back toward the counter. Unfortunately, she didn't get there because she slipped on something and hit her head on the floor. "Ow!" she shouted as black spots danced in her vision. She shook her head and sat up, lifting a hand to the back of her head. "Gosh, that hurt..."

Mike and Jeremy rushed over to her and knelt down. "Are you okay?" Mike asked.

She nodded as they helped her to her feet. "Yeah, I'm fine."

Once I was on my feet, Jeremy let go of her arm and flailed his hand around, black liquid flying everywhere. "Why is there oil on you?"

"Huh?" Zoe tilted her head and examined her uniform. Sure enough, the entire back of it was stained black. She glanced down at the floor. There was a small puddle of oil right by the door. She must have slipped on it when she walked back into the kitchen.

"What's that from?" Springtrap wondered. She was standing right beside the door, staring at the floor.

Zoe looked up at her and raised an eyebrow. "Look at your arm."

She stared at her. "Why?"

"Just do it."

Springtrap shrugged and looked at her right arm. Her sleeve was black and oil was running down her arm, dripping off her hand and pooling together on the floor.

She furrowed her brow. "Whoa. How'd that happen?"

Zoe stepped forward and rolled up Springtrap's sleeve. There was a large gash in her arm gushing oil onto the ground. "I have no idea."

The door suddenly swung open. "Hey guys!" Scott said, ushering Vincent into the room before him. Vincent looked slightly angry, but definitely not as mad as he did before. His right sleeve was rolled up and a bandage was wrapped around his upper arm. Zoe couldn't see the other scars on his arm. She figured that they were covered up with makeup. Scott was just leading Vincent to the pizza on the counter when something in Zoe's mind clicked.

"Wait," she said, letting go of Springtrap and grabbing Scott's shoulder.

He stopped in his tracks and turned around. "What?"

She reached around him and grabbed Vincent's wrist, who yelped in pain when she pulled him back. "Just come here for a sec."

"What are you doing?" Vincent grumbled, trying to break out of her grip without hurting himself. Zoe ignored him and started pulling him towards Springtrap.

She turned around. "Stand beside her," she ordered, pointing at Springtrap. He reluctantly obliged. Zoe looked back and forth from Springtrap's wound to Vincent's. They were both in the same exact spot, and they looked to be the exact same length as well.

 **idk how to end this chapter i can't think of anything so here have a shitty chapter ending because my past self ended it weirdly and i can't think of anything that would make it better**


	11. Chapter 11

**i wish i could go back in time and smack my younger self in the face**

 **SHOUT OUTS: frozem1 (thanks), Fate12343 (I just watched some and I have no idea what's happening), xEnderAwesomex (I have no idea what it's called), AVFireblade9472 (I wouldn't call it "pain-sharing" because she can't feel pain, but yeah, basically), The Derpy Fox (why?) Scarlet Firesong (YEAH IT IS), and OppsieDasi and RubyFireLight for following and favouriting the story**

 **Chapter 11**

 ***3 days later***

"MOM! BB stole my favourite sweater!"

"I did not! She's lying!"

"I am not, you little twerp!"

"I'm not a twerp! And you can shut up!"

Zoe sighed. "BB, did you take Spring's sweater?"

BB crossed his arms. "No! Why would I?"

Springtrap huffed. "I know he did! It was either him or Bonnie and Teddy, and I already talked to them."

 _CRASH!_

Zoe immediately whirled around and ran towards the kitchen, leaving the other two to their pointless argument _._ Couldn't the animatronics just calm down for a little while?

She flung the kitchen doors open and sighed. "Really, Mangle? Again?"

Mangle was lying on the floor surrounded by now broken plates. He grinned sheepishly as Tonnie bent down to help him up. "Sorry! I just thought I could get it this time."

Zoe rolled her eyes and grabbed the cookie jar from on top of the cupboards. "Even if you could grow, there's no way you could've grown enough to reach the top of the cupboards. Just ask me next time."

Mangle nodded and grabbed the jar in both hands. "Thanks. I will," he said for the fifth time in three days.

Zoe heard an angry scream come from the dining room and she rolled her eyes, dashing out of the kitchen. Freddy was standing at the far wall, looking half-shocked and half-enraged. "Freddy Fazfuck" was written on the wall in the main dining room. Bonnie and Teddy were both standing behind the curtains of Pirate's Cove, snickering with cans of spray paint in their hands. Foxy stood right outside the cove, shielding the two from Freddy's view and trying not to laugh.

She was about to go over there and chew them out for doing that, but then Chica ran into the room and came up to her. "Have you seen Tia?"

Zoe shook her head. "No. Sorry."

Chica sighed and crossed her arms. "I haven't seen her for at least an hour. Do you know any place she could've hidden?"

She shook her head again. "Nope. Why don't you try-"

Chica suddenly gasped and pointed at the backstage door. A dark pink piece of fabric that looked like the hem of Tia's skirt was sticking out from under the door. Chica ran toward the door. "I found you! I found you!" she squealed, pulling the door open.

Tia was sitting on the checkered floor and she smiled. "It took you long enough! Okay, now you go hide!"

"Okay!" Chica said. She dashed off as Tia stood with her face to the wall, counting quietly under her breath.

"Hi."

Zoe yelped and turned around. Mari was standing behind her, looking kind of nervous. She backed up so she could see her better. Why did she have to make the Marionette so tall?

Zoe nodded. "Hey, Mari. What's up?"

Mari shrugged, nervously fiddling with her red tie. "I just wanted to know if we might start working soon. That's kind of why you built us, right?"

Zoe nodded again. "Yeah. Vincent said you guys start tomorrow. Why did you ask?"

Mari sighed. "Just... Is that all you made us for? Working?"

She heard a yelp from across the room and whirled around to see Freddy gripping Foxy's coat by the collar. Freddy had pinned him against the wall and was yelling at him about kids seeing what he did. Foxy was frantically pointing at the now closed curtains of Pirate's Cove and trying to lay all the blame on Bonnie and Teddy (although it probably _was_ their idea; they'd been pulling pranks like that for the past three days).

Zoe shook her head and sighed. "I don't know. I really need to go. I'm sorry," she apologized as she left to go sort out the issue. She almost reached them when suddenly the room went silent. She looked up and saw Vincent and Scott standing at the doors, grocery bags in their hands.

Vincent looked around the room. Mangle and Tonnie were sitting on a table and had cookie crumbs all over their faces, Freddy and Foxy were practically at each others' throats, and Bonnie and Teddy had fell through the curtain and were sprawled on the floor and frozen mid-laugh.

Vincent gave a small sigh. "We leave you people alone for one hour to get food, and this happens. Where's Schmidt, Fitzgerald, and Smith?"

Zoe shrugged. "I have no idea. I think they left."

Mari shivered. "Gosh, he's creepy."

Vincent held the bags in his hands out to Scott, who took them and walked off to the kitchen. Vincent crossed his arms. "Well, how about we get everything cleaned up. Mangle, Tonnie, put the cookie jar away. Chica, come out from under that tablecloth. Springtrap, I took your sweater to the dry cleaners to get the oil stains out. And whoever wrote that on the wall-"

Teddy quickly picked up a spray paint can and shoved it in Foxy's hand, who growled. "Hey! I didn't-"

"Is a fucking genius," Vincent finished.

Bonnie raised his eyebrows. "Oh, that was me and Te-"

"Who will have to paint over it, however."

Foxy snickered and tossed the can to Teddy, who just managed to catch it. "Have fun."

"Foxy, you can help, since I know you had a hand in this."

Bonnie and Teddy snorted. Freddy smirked. "Well, you have fun with that." He stalked off, putting his thumb and index finger in the shape of an "L" over his forehead as he did so.

As everyone dispersed, Zoe turned and gaped at Vincent. She'd been trying to get the robots to calm down for an hour, and he just walked into the room and everyone just stopped what they were doing. "How the hell did you get them to actually do what you asked?"

Vincent smirked and shrugged. "I just told them what to do, and they did it. Not that complicated, you know. It's not my fault they don't listen to you." He calmly lit a cigarette and strolled past her, going towards his room. He'd asked her to try and pick the lock a couple days ago, and she had only agreed because he seemed to be having a bad day. Now she was starting to regret doing him a favour.

 _ **xXx**_

 _Goldie was sitting on the bed of a small bedroom. He looked around and saw four stuffed animals piled in the corner of the room. One looked like a yellow duck or chicken thing, another was a purple bunny, the third was a brown bear with a top hat, and he couldn't exactly tell what the last one was because its head was ripped off. It was red and had a hook for a hand though, and it kind of reminded him of Foxy. The walls were covered in bright white wallpaper, and a dark blue dresser stood in the another corner. He looked down and saw that he was wearing a black and grey striped t-shirt and a pair of blue pants. His body looked a lot smaller, like a kid's. He touched his arm with one hand and furrowed his eyebrows. He didn't feel cold, like metal. What was this on him? He read it in a book the other day... Skin. That's what it was, right?_

"What did he do this time?" _a voice asked from behind him._

 _Goldie turned around and saw a little yellow bear plushie sitting on the pillows. It had a purple hat and bow tie, along with completely black eyes that had little white dots for pupils. Goldie adjusted his position to see it better, and the bear's eyes seemed to follow his movements._

"He locked you in your room again," _the voice said again. It seemed to be coming from the bear._

 _Goldie looked up and saw the closed door. He got up and tried to turn the knob. It didn't budge._

 _He started to freak out. He didn't want to be trapped in a room alone with just a talking bear for company._

"Don't be scared," _the bear said when it saw his distressed expression._ "I am here with you."

 _Goldie whirled around in a panic. He felt tears start to leak from his eyes. He was scared, but he didn't know why. He walked towards the plushies in the corner and picked up the headless one. For some reason, the sight of its red fur made him want to throw up. He immediately hated that plushie. It scared him. Even though it had no head, he felt like it could see him, and it hated him right back._

 _He dropped it and ran to the door. He wrapped his small fingers around the handle and turned the knob, tugging frantically on the door and sobbing. Tears ran down his face and fell to the carpet. Goldie hit his tiny palm against the door, calling for someone, anyone, to let him out of that room. He sank to the floor and curled up into a ball, hugging his knees to his chest and crying quietly._

"Tomorrow is another day," _the bear's voice said. Goldie looked up and saw it sitting at his feet, staring up at him with sad eyes._

 _Goldie let out a relieved gasp and grabbed the plush, wrapping his arms around it. He wasn't alone._

Goldie yelped and shot up straight in his sleeping bag. The lights were on in the kitchen, and he looked up at the wall to check the clock. It was eleven in the morning. He'd really slept in. Why didn't anyone wake him?

"Hey, Goldie," a voice said. He looked up and saw Scott putting food in the cupboards. Plastic grocery bags sat on the counter beside him.

Goldie rubbed his eyes and yawned. "Why didn't you wake me up? I could've helped," he said as Scott put the last of the food away.

The security guard shrugged. "We figured you needed your rest. Did you sleep well?"

Goldie thought back to his dream and shuddered. "I guess."

Scott grinned, crumpling the bags into a ball and tossing them into a recycle bin. "Great. By the way, Vincent said you guys are starting work tomorrow."

Goldie's eyes widened. He wasn't sure if he should be happy or worried. "Really?"

Scott laughed at his expression. "Yeah. But don't worry, you'll do fine," he said as he walked out of the kitchen.

Goldie sat there in his sleeping bag. He would be working tomorrow. He would be doing the thing he was meant to do. He'd been waiting for this for three days, but now he wasn't sure what to think.

"Tomorrow is another day," he whispered to himself.


	12. Chapter 12

**SHOUT OUTS: frozem1 (thanks), FOXYISLUVFOXYISL (YouR REVIEW MADE MY DAY THANK YOU), Fate12343 (thank you), i am mi-chan for following the story, MoonLightShadowNight123, UltimateOne, and DragonPhoenix1026 for favouriting and following the story, and UltimateOne for favouriting me!**

 **Chapter 12**

Vincent was pacing back and forth in the dining room, his employees and the robots lined up against the stage. He held his hands behind his back, and he looked like a military sergeant explaining a battle plan to his troops. All the security guards, including Zoe, looked a bit skittish, like they were afraid they were going to get fired or something. Seeing her mom like that made Mari kind of concerned. Zoe was usually never scared of Vincent. Or maybe she was just worried about what would happen on their first day of work. Either way, it made Mari nervous.

Vincent kept pacing as he began to speak. "Alright, we're starting work today. We're opening at noon today, but every day after this one, we'll be opening at ten in the morning. I've assigned everyone jobs. Mari, BB, you two will be in the Prize Corner, watching the kids in the ball pit and giving out prizes when they win at games."

"Okay." Mari nodded.

BB grinned. "Sure thing."

Vincent turned to the Toys. "Tia, Teddy, and Tonnie, you three will be making pizza and serving it to the kids."

Tia gave a slight nod as she twisted her hair in two braids on either side of her head. "Alright!"

Teddy snorted. "Seriously?"

Tonnie adjusted his vest. "I can do that."

"Freddy, Chica, and Bonnie, you'll be in the Party Rooms, organizing games and entertaining the kids."

"Yes sir."

"Sure!"

"And deal with those brats? Really?"

"Shut up, Bonnie." Vincent narrowed his eyes at him before turning away. "Foxy, Mangle, you'll be in Pirate's Cove, playing with the other kids."

"AYE-AYE, CAP'N!" they both shouted simultaneously.

"But maybe don't be that loud. Springtrap, Goldie, you'll be standing at the doors and basically welcoming everyone to the new Freddy Fazbear's."

"Alright then."

"Sounds easy enough."

"Mike, Jeremy, Zoe, you guys will be walking around, keeping the kids away from the Parts and Service room, make sure no one gets bitten this time, all that."

"Alright, boss."

"Uh, okay, I guess..."

"Sure."

"Scott, Fritz, you two will be on the night shift. You can go home and rest until then."

Scott shrugged. "'Kay."

Fritz looked a little skittish, however. "Will it be... safe? You know, the night shift?"

Vincent shrugged. "You tell me. You're the one who programmed them."

Teddy rolled his eyes. "Yeah, Tubby. Besides, it's not like we would even be awake at night."

Fritz shot Teddy a glare. "Hey, I'm technically your father. Don't talk to me like that."

Bonnie snorted. "Okay, _Dad_. You can relax. We're not gonna murder you in the middle of the night or anything."

"Don't worry, Fritz!" Chica said, smiling at the security guard. "Everything will be okay! Right guys?" She looked to the other robots.

Tia nodded, tying hair elastics into the ends of her braids. "We'll stay in the kitchen, I promise!"

Vincent raised an eyebrow at Fritz. "See?" He glanced up at the clock above the doors. "Okay, we've already put up some flyers around town, and put an ad in the paper, so there should hopefully be some people here in an hour-" He was suddenly interrupted by a loud squeal that sounded like it came from outside.

Mari tilted her head. What was that?

Everyone furrowed their eyebrows and looked towards the glass doors. Outside, a group of maybe five girls stood gaping at them through the glass. One of the girls pointed at the glass. "FOXY!" she shrieked. Then she and her friends exploded into a fit of squeals and giggles, a couple of them even whipping out their phones and taking pictures.

Mari raised an eyebrow and turned to look at Foxy, who looked seriously flustered. "What is that all about?" she questioned.

Foxy blinked. "I don't know, to be honest."

Teddy rolled his eyes. "Those girls are ridiculous."

Bonnie crossed his arms. "Yeah. I mean, Teddy and I look as good as he does," he said, gesturing towards Foxy. "Maybe even better."

Tia waved cheerfully at the small crowd that was starting to gather outside the restaurant. "Hi! Welcome to Freddy's!" Some of the people waved back, and she giggled. "They seem so friendly!"

Tonnie backed up against the stage. "I don't know. They're scaring me a little..."

Mangle gave a laugh and put his arm around Tonnie's shoulders. "Calm down and quite bein' such a yellow-belly!"

Tonnie furrowed his eyebrows and looked down at his bright blue vest and black leggings. "I'm not wearing any yellow, though."

Mangle chuckled and ruffled Tonnie's sky blue hair with his free hand, making a couple of the girls outside squeak and start rambling about- boats, maybe? Mari wasn't sure. "Relax. It's just an expression. It means that you should quit bein' a coward!"

Tonnie nodded in understanding. "Oh. Okay."

Freddy adjusted his bow tie and straightened his top hat. "Shall we open the doors, now that people are here?" he asked Vincent.

Vincent hesitated, staring at the mob outside. "Alright," he said finally. "Open up the doors."

Mari looked at the people, a lot of whom were screaming and pounding on the doors. They were still yelling about boats- no, ships, it sounded like. _Whatever,_ she thought. _Same thing, anyway_.

"Are you sure?" Zoe asked. "They look a bit hyper."

Vincent shrugged. "Might as well. Besides, they won't hurt anyone."

Scott walked over to the doors, pulling a keyring out of his pocket. He took a deep breath and unlocked the doors.


	13. Chapter 13

**oh god i remember this chapter i wrote this at around halloween 2015 holy shit here we go**

 **SHOUT OUTS: Fate12343 (yeah, me too), HunterHero179 (:D), frozem1 (I get the feeling you're going to say that every chapter), AVFireBlade9472 (oh god, Mangle and Tonnie would kill them), Silver Moonlight Blossom for following the story, Animal Lover6848 for following and favouriting the story, and Dragon-Byte for following and favouriting me and the story!**

 **Chapter 13**

Everything was mass chaos.

Foxy was hiding from the fangirls in Pirate's Cove, Mangle and Tonnie were surrounded by shippers asking them if they were a couple, a bunch of girls were trying to push Jeremy and Mike towards each other and were talking about something called jeremike (whatever that was), Bonnie and Teddy were flirting with a lot of them (to which none of the girls were protesting), Tia was smiling and talking with everyone, and Zoe couldn't even see any of the others in that mess.

Zoe pushed through the crowd, trying to find Vincent so he could get those people out of there. Unfortunately, a bunch of girls walked up to her, holding phones. They all had some kind of Freddy Fazbear merchandise with them. The one in front had a black t-shirt with pictures of the old animatronics on it, the two behind her sported hair clips shaped like the old Freddy's head, and a few others had backpacks with the Fazbear Entertainment logo on them. The girls smiled as they surrounded Zoe. They all started spouting random questions: "What's your name?" "Are you the guard from Fazbear's Fright?" "Is Jeremike canon?" "What gender is the Mangle?" "Are you dating any of the guards or animatronics?" "What happened to the kid from '87?"

Zoe tried to scoot past them as she answered. "Zoe Nova, no, I have no idea what that is, boy, no way in hell, probably died. Can I go now?"

"Just wait!" one of the girls moved in front of her, blocking her path. "We still have a few more questions!"

"Is the purple guy really the murderer?"

"Is Purplephone canon?"

"Why did you redesign the animatronics?"

Zoe sighed and was about to answer when she saw a flash of orange hair. She ran towards it, muttering some lame excuse. She reached Fritz and grabbed his arm. "Fritz! These girls have some questions. Could you answer them while I go find Vincent?"

Fritz blinked and looked past her, staring at the girls. They squealed as soon as they saw him and started jumping up and down and snapping photos.

The security guard shrugged. "I guess."

Zoe heaved a sigh of relief. "Thank you." She shoved past him and began wading through the crowd, looking for Vincent.

 _ **xXx**_

Vincent sighed as he wrapped a bandage around his leg. As soon as that mob of girls had flooded into the restaurant, the majority of the girls had swarmed around all of the animatronics, but a few had decided to go exploring around the pizzeria. Vincent had found a few playing with the toaster in his room. He had no idea why people seemed to find toasters fascinating, but as soon as they saw him, they forgot all about the toaster. They'd rushed towards him and started asking him if he would sign their foreheads in permanent marker. When he declined, the girls had gotten really pushy and annoyed, and they had accidentaly reopened at least seven of his scars. Not really big ones, but when the girls saw the blood, they started frantically apologizing and left immediately.

"What is the matter with fangirls?" he muttered as he swiped blood off his hand with an old towel he'd found on his floor. Not really the most sanitary way to clean a cut, but at least the blood was off. "Always screaming at people they love. I love toast, but when it pops up, I'm not like, 'AAAAAHHHH!'"

Somebody knocked on the door, and Vincent sighed. He leaned over the sink and pushed his violet fringe away from his face. "Go away. I'm not signing your faces."

"Don't worry, there are no crazy fangirls out here. It's me. Zoe."

Vincent groaned. "And _how_ exactly is that better?"

Zoe heaved a frustrated sigh and opened up the door without waiting for Vincent's permission. "Could we close up the pizzeria? Things are getting pretty crazy out there."

Vincent turned to face the doorway, leaning against the sink. "How crazy, exactly?"

Zoe thought for a moment. "Well, Mangle got so scared, he climbed up the wall like Spiderman and is hanging from the light fixtures, Foxy almost jabbed someone in the eye with his hook, one girl stole Freddy's hat, I lost Goldie, I found BB hiding in the Parts and Service room, the girls seem to be trying to make Jeremy and Mike kiss for some reason-"

Vincent held up a hand, cutting her off. "Okay. I'll be out in a second."

 _ **xXx**_

 _Goldie was in the same room he had been in before. The yellow bear was sitting on the bed in the same place. The other plushies were in the corner of the room, just like they had been before. He cast a nervous glance at the headless fox, hoping it wouldn't be able to see him. It was a silly assumption, that a headless inanimate object could see things, but Goldie wasn't taking any chances. Suddenly, he heard a voice._

"You know he is hiding again."

 _Goldie whirled around and saw the yellow bear. It had shifted its position so it was facing him. Goldie walked over to it and picked it up, He suddenly felt very safe. As long as he had this little plush, he didn't feel quite so alone._

 _Goldie smiled and hugged the little bear to his chest. Then he turned to face the door, wondering if he could leave this room. It had been locked shut the first time he'd been there, but now it was wide open. He tiptoed over to it and peered out cautiously. He didn't see much. All there was outside was an old-fashioned grandfather clock, plus a few blurry photographs hanging on the wall. Goldie glanced around and walked out, deciding that it was safe to leave._ _He looked to his right. There was an open doorway in the wall. The same was on his left._

"He won't stop until you find him," _the bear in his arms said, a twinge of concern in its voice._

 _Goldie looked down at the plush. He didn't even know who the bear was talking about, but he was scared anyway._

 _He turned to the left doorway. The room beyond was brightly lit, and inside, he could see a bed with a pink bedspread on it, along with a painting of a light pink flower. There were a bunch of metal parts on the floor. He walked in and crouched down to examine the metal. It seemed to be a dismantled animatronic, maybe a fox. But the head was pink, and he didn't know of any breed of fox that was naturally pink._

 _He got up and left the room, wondering why someone would take apart a robot and leave it on the floor._

 _Goldie walked through the room with the clock and crept up to the entrance of the right doorway. He looked inside and saw nothing special; just a blue couch, a bright orange rug, and a television on a dark, blood-red table. It looked so ordinary, yet something felt... off. Weird. Like there was someone else in there with him, but he couldn't see them._

 _Tightening his grip on the plush, he slowly sneaked into the room. He passed the couch, and almost made it past the rug, but what looked like a person in a red fox mask suddenly leaped out from behind the TV, making a weird noise that was a cross between a screech, a roar, and a growl. Goldie screamed and immediately collapsed on the carpet. He hugged the bear as he felt tears spill from his eyes and glide along his skin, dripping soundlessly onto the rug._

"Tomorrow is another day."

 _ **xXx**_

"Goldie. Goldie, wake up. Come on. They're leaving."

Goldie's eyes snapped open, and he shot upwards, accidentally bashing his forehead into someone else's. He didn't really feel it, of course; he couldn't feel pain. But the other person yelped. "Ow!"

Goldie inhaled sharply, even though he didn't need the oxygen, being a robot. "Oh, Sorry, Mom."

Zoe smiled and she offered him a hand. "It's okay. Worse things have happened to me than getting hit in the head. Do you remember what happened?"

Goldie took her hand and she hoisted him to his feet. He racked his brain, trying to think, and then it clicked: the fangirls, practically getting trampled by the stampede of people trying to get to Foxy, getting hit on the head by someone's backpack, his software glitching, and then...

Goldie nodded. "Yeah," he said quickly.

Zoe grinned. "Good. Let's just go into the Parts and Service room and check your software to make sure you're fine, okay?"

Goldie nodded blankly. "Yeah. Okay."

He let Zoe drag him away down the hall, and thought about the dream he'd just had. This dream and the one before were definitely connected, there was no doubt about that. But were they just random dreams that his mind created in his sleep? Or did they actually mean something?

He was determined to find out.


	14. Chapter 14

**happy spooky time motherfuckers**

 **SHOUT OUTS: Fate12343 (thanks :D), HunterHero579 (I WAS HOPING SOMEONE WOULD GET THAT REFERENCE! TIME FOR A TEA PARTY!), Dante Watterson (thank you :D), frozem1 (this is actually kind of funny, you saying the same thing over and over again :D), and LoveMe2346 for favouriting and following the story!**

 **Chapter 14**

Scott sighed and locked the doors to the pizzeria. "I hope they don't come back tomorrow," he muttered to no one in particular.

Jeremy nodded as he wiped a lipstick mark off his cheek. Half the fangirls had been trying to get him and Mike to kiss, while the other half had been trying to kiss them themselves.

Foxy and Freddy, who had been hiding in Pirate's Cove, peeked out from behind the purple curtains. "Is it safe?" Foxy asked nervously, glancing around the room.

Mike gave a quick nod, picking up Styrofoam plates and cups off the ground. "They're gone now. You can come out."

Mangle let go of the light fixture he was hanging on to and dropped to the floor, landing gracefully on his feet. "Gosh, that was terrifying."

Tonnie yelped as he fell from the ceiling and landed not as gracefully. He hit the floor with flat feet and toppled over backwards. He couldn't feel pain, but it definitely didn't feel good as he smacked his head on the black and white tiles.

Mangle laughed and grabbed his hand, pulling him back up. "Good try, matey."

Tonnie grinned at his friend. "Thanks." Mangle returned his gratitude with a hearty laugh that was slightly higher pitched than his brother's.

Freddy straightened his top hat. "Those girls were insane!" he declared in his British accented voice. "Seriously, what the hell was wrong with them?"

Zoe, who had just pulled Goldie to his feet, shrugged. "Fangirls," she said simply, as if saying that explained everything that had just happened.

Mike growled and smoothed down his hair. "That was fucking chaos."

Goldie bent down and plucked his purple top hat off the ground. He dusted it off and set it on his head before turning back to Zoe. "I'm going to go find Mari and BB." He walked off towards the Parts and Service room, where they had been hiding during the fangirl rampage. Some of the girls had been making fun of BB, and a few had actually hit him; he probably hadn't felt any pain, of course, but he'd looked pretty traumatized the last time Tonnie had seen him.

Zoe looked at the cluster of animatronics and security guards in the room. "How about you all go to the kitchen?" she suggested. "I'll go find the others, and we'll meet you there." She ran off, and the others walked through the kitchen doors.

 ** _xXx_**

BB sat curled up in the corner of the Parts and Service room, wrapped in Mari's arms. There were a few gashes on his arms, spilling black oil onto his brightly coloured clothes. He couldn't feel anything, not physically, but mentally, he was most likely scarred for life.

The door opened and he flinched, expecting some more crazy girls to barge in and start yelling at him about how stupid he was, and that he was a terrible person for trying to kill the security guards. BB had argued that he never tried to kill anyone, but they weren't having any of that. They'd kept yelling, and then they had started beating him up.

He was pulled out of his thoughts when Goldie walked into the room. He saw BB and Mari and walked over, crouching down so he was at their eye level. "Hey kiddo," he said quietly, as though BB were made of glass and speaking any louder might make him shatter. "You okay?"

BB shrank back. He wasn't in the mood for talking right then.

Mari seemed to sense his distress and answered for him. "He's bleeding, but that's not why I'm worried. He hasn't said anything since I showed up."

Goldie furrowed his eyebrows. "Oh. Do you think Zoe could help?" he asked her.

Mari looked down at BB. "Do you want to see Mom? Could she help?" She was speaking in the same tone as Goldie, quiet and concerned.

BB didn't say anything, only nodded.

Goldie smiled. "Great. Should we go find her?"

Another nod.

He let go of Mari and stood up; the other two stood with him. Goldie and Mari each put an arm around him and they all walked out of the room together.

 _ **xXx**_

Zoe walked into the kitchen, followed by Chica, Tia, Springtrap, Vincent, Teddy, and Bonnie, and found a giant food fight.

Pizza and cake were splattered on the walls, Scott and Jeremy had taken shelter behind a counter, Fritz was trying to catch food with his mouth, Freddy was running around the room, trying to dodge the food, and Foxy was cussing like a sailor.

Zoe barged in and snatched a pizza out of Mike's hand just as he was about to throw it. "Why?"

He turned around. "We got bored," he said. "And why should you care? You've never passed up a good opportunity for a food fight before."

She shrugged. "I know. And I never will," she stated simply, smushing the pizza in his face.

The robots behind her giggled and ran in. They each grabbed some kind of edible ammunition and began throwing. Bonnie and Teddy teamed up with Mangle and Tonnie and they all ganged up on Freddy, who was trying to shield himself with a frying pan.

Mike swiped a bunch of cheese and sauce off his face and plucked a chocolate cupcake off the counter. "You're gonna get it now, Supernova," he said, grinning.

Before she could react, he shoved the cupcake in her face, smearing icing across her nose and cheeks.

She picked up a half eaten piece of pizza and was about to retaliate when she felt someone tug on her sleeve. She turned around and immediately lowered the pizza when she saw who it was. BB was standing there, oil all over his once blue and red shirt. On either side of him stood Mari and Goldie, and BB looked extremely close to tears.

 **have a fun halloween**


	15. Chapter 15

**SHOUT OUTS: HunterHero179 (you seem very hyper), ZombieSlayers (thank you :D), howlingwolf8648 (I think I'm the only person who likes BB in the actual game), AVFireBlade9472 (nevermind, I have to agree that he is kind of obnoxious), queen of cheese covered 11ammas for following the story, 6000halos for following and favouriting the story, and goldentrap and ZombieSlayers for following and favouriting me and the story!**

 **Chapter 15**

Zoe brushed BB's hair away from his face as he squirmed in his sleeping bag. He'd had a rough day, and after getting him something to eat and fixing up his injuries, he'd decided to go straight to bed. It was four thirty p.m., but he seemed pretty content with missing dinner and going to bed early.

Zoe kissed his forehead. "Goodnight."

He smiled. "Goodnight, Mom."

She got up and left the room, quietly shutting the door behind her. She turned around and saw Vincent sitting at one of the tables, reading a book. He glanced up from his book to look at her. "Is he feeling okay?" he asked, surprisingly gently.

She raised an eyebrow. He never seemed to care about the robots before. "Yeah, he's perfectly fine."

Vincent nodded. "Okay. Good. I just wanted to make sure that he wasn't too badly hurt."

This time, she raised both eyebrows. "Are you drunk or something?"

He looked confused. "What? No. Why do you ask?"

She shrugged and sat down on the chair opposite him. "You just don't seem to care about the animatronics. Heck, the only person you _ever_ seem to care about is Scott, and even then..." She shrugged again.

He sighed. "There's a reason I don't care about people."

"What's the reason?" Zoe asked, curious. She knew nothing about the guy, and she wanted to know more about him.

He rolled his eyes. "I shouldn't have said anything," he whispered to himself. He shut his book and stood up, walking off towards his room and leaving the book lying on the table.

 _ **xXx**_

Scott rapped his knuckles on the door to Vincent's room. "Hey, Vince. You missed supper."

There was no response.

Scott sighed and opened the door. "Come on, you have to eat someth-" His sentence was cut off by a sudden coughing fit, courtesy of the smoke billowing out from the room.

He waved a hand in front of his face and walked into the room. Vincent was laying on the bed, his face buried in a pillow. His hat was tossed carelessly on the floor. His hand dangled over the side of the bed, a lit cigarette held loosely between two fingers. He'd freed his violet hair of its usual yellow hair elastic, and it was spread out across the pillow, obscuring his face from Scott's vision.

Scott sat down on the edge of the bed. "I'm going on the night shift in four hours," he said in an attempt to make conversation. "Should I be in the office with Fritz, or just do what I've always done before?"

Vincent shrugged and said nothing.

Scott sighed. He swung his legs up onto the bed and lay on his back beside Vincent. "What's wrong?"

Vincent shook his head, which Scott took as "There's nothing wrong. Now get out unless you have a death wish."

"There's definitely something wrong," the security guard protested. "You've been acting weird all day. What's going on?"

Vincent didn't say anything. Instead, he dropped the cigarette in his hand and reached down pick something up off the floor. He brought his arm up, and clutched tightly his was a yellow teddy bear, wearing a purple bow tie and top hat.

Scott understood immediately. He nodded. "Oh. Okay. Should I just-" He pointed at the open doorway.

Vincent nodded and adjusted his position so he was laying on his side, facing away from Scott. He hugged the little bear to his chest and stayed silent.

 ** _xXx_**

 _Goldie wasn't surprised to find that he was back in the house. He was sitting on the floor, with a flashlight clutched tightly in his small hands. But this time, he couldn't see anything. He patted the floor around him. The little yellow bear didn't seem to be there this time, which concerned him. He really was alone this time._

 _He was just about to stand up and explore the place when a deep demonic voice called out. "Hello?"_

 _He gasped and immediately flicked the switch on the flashlight. He appeared to be in a hallway, open doorways lining the the end of the corridor, a small white chair sat under a window. The scene would have been peaceful, if not for the terrifying abomination sitting on top of the chair._

 _It looked very similar to Balloon Boy, what with the rosy cheeks and colourful clothing, but the similarities ended there. Its hands dangled beside the chair, the claw-tipped fingers just brushing the floor. Its mouth hung open, revealing two sets of sharp teeth. Its red eyes were looking straight at him, and he inhaled sharply. He quickly turned the light off. He didn't want to look at that thing again._

 _The creature spoke again. "Hello?"_

 _Goldie was almost paralyzed with fear. He fumbled with the light, and turned it on. The thing was on the floor, and it immediately flew back up onto the chair. He shut it off and stayed silent. Maybe the thing would leave him alone if it thought he wasn't there. He heard a deep laugh, but didn't dare turn it back on. Finally, he couldn't stand it. He turned the light on to see if it was still there. The thing was frozen on the floor, its mouth still hanging open, its claws tangled up in the blue carpet._

 _It went on like that for about the next minute. Goldie would turn on the light and see if it was still there, and each time he turned it off, he left it off for longer and longer, thinking that it would leave him be if he didn't torture it with the light. Every time it was on, the thing was either frozen on the floor or somersaulting into a doorway._

 _Finally, the thing leaped out of a room and reached for him, clawing at his face with its grotesque claws and making a terrible screeching sound. Goldie screamed, and everything disappeared._

 ** _xXx_**

 _Balloon Boy had no idea where he was. It felt like he was sitting down on a chair, but he didn't know anything else about his surroundings. His hands felt heavier, and they dangled at his sides. He tried to lift them, with very little success. His teeth were different as well; they felt heavy in his mouth, and his head tipped forwards from the weight. He ran his tongue along the top row of teeth and found that they were sharp, like spikes._

 _"Hello?" he called out, but his voice was a lot deeper somehow. It sounded almost demonic._

 _Suddenly, a light flashed on, and he squinted. His eyes adjusted to the light, and he saw that he was sitting on a little wooden chair at the end of a hallway. Behind the glaring light was a small child with brown hair and a terrified expression on his face. They clutched a flashlight in their small, trembling hands. The beam of the flashlight shook as they shined it at BB._

 _As suddenly as it appeared, the light clicked off. A few seconds passed, and BB called out again. "Hello?"_

 _The light flicked on again, and the child's face was visible again. Their eyes were wide open, and they were staring at BB as though he were some kind of monster. Seeing the kid like this was surprisingly amusing. The light disappeared again, and BB laughed. With great effort, he pushed himself off the chair. He slowly crept towards where he thought the child was._

 _The kid flicked the flashlight on, and BB jumped backwards, landing perfectly back on the chair. BB stared at the kid's scared face and had to restrain himself from laughing. For the next minute or so, he fell into a simple routine; when the light was off, he'd crawl towards the kid and taunt him with laughing; when it was on, he'd either freeze where he was on the ground or duck into a doorway._

 _Finally, the kid left the light off for too long. BB jumped out from the room he was hiding in and lunged at the little child. The kid flicked on the flashlight at the last moment, illuminating BB's long, clawed fingers as they grabbed at the kid. BB gnashed his teeth together, snapping at the boy's face, and the little child screamed._


	16. Chapter 16

**SHOUT OUTS: HunterHero179 (i was laughing while reading your review and i don't know why i think i'm just tired), StormCloud666 (and now BB is having them too), Guest (hmm...), and FiveNightsAtFreddy's123Fan for favouriting the story!**

 **Chapter 16**

BB woke up with a start. He was breathing heavily, and he couldn't see anything. He began to panic before he remembered that he was in the kitchen. He'd gone to bed. The fangirls, Goldie and Mari, Mom...

He took a deep breath and sat up. He was terrified, but he didn't know why. Then he was suddenly slapped with the memory of his nightmare. He shuddered. Just thinking about it made him want to cry.

"BB?" A voice in the corner of the room said. BB gasped, as the voice sounded suspiciously similar to that of the horrified child from his nightmare. He saw something move, and a flashlight flicked on. BB shrank down in his sleeping bag, but the light wasn't pointed at him. It was aimed at the ceiling, probably just to illuminate the room and keep the beam from his eyes.

BB blinked. Gears whirred in his head, adjusting his eyes to the light. When he could see, he let out a sigh of relief. It was Goldie, still in his rumpled yellow suit. His bow tie and top hat were on the floor beside his sleeping bag, and his hair stuck up at odd angles. He looked really tired. The flashlight was held loosely in one hand, and he leaned back on his free arm. "You okay?" he asked quietly.

BB nodded. "Yeah. I'm fine. What time is it?"

Goldie directed the light at the clock on the wall. "Uh, twelve-eleven." He looked back at BB. "Are you sure you're okay? Did you have a nightmare or something?"

BB opened his mouth to respond, but no words came out. He couldn't bring himself to tell Goldie about that dream he had.

Instead, he simply nodded. "Yeah. I'm fine, though."

Goldie raised an eyebrow. "You're not sure."

BB sighed and said nothing.

Goldie nodded. He walked across the room and handed BB the flashlight. "Here. I'm gonna go find Dad. He should be on the night shift by now."

BB took the light in his small hands. "Okay."

Goldie smiled and ruffled his hair. He tiptoed towards the door, stepping over the other sleeping robots. The door swung open, he pulled it shut behind him as he walked out of the kitchen.

 _ **xXx**_

Scott held a tablet out to Fritz, who took it hesitantly in one hand. "This is a new tablet that Vincent bought," he explained. "Unfortunately, we don't have a camera in the kitchen, but if anyone breaks into the pizzeria, the robots would be able to take care of them."

Fritz took a shaky breath. "So, there's no music box, no mask, no nothing? They won't be any threat at all?"

Scott nodded. "All you have to do is flip through the cameras and make sure no one breaks into the place. That's it."

"Where will you be?" Fritz asked.

Scott shrugged. "Maybe the Parts and Service room or something. I don't know. I'm just gonna walk around a bit. Just don't freak out if you see me on the cameras. I won't come to the office and kill you, I swear."

Fritz laughed nervously. "Yeah. Okay. Is that it?"

"Yep," Scott replied. "Everything is basically the same."

Fritz pushed a button on the tablet. It flickered to life, showing an image of the Game Area in the main party room. An icon sat in the bottom left corner, made up of a bunch of little rectangles with a number on each. He pressed his thumb to a rectangle that said "CAM 09". The party room was replaced by a picture of the main stage. He kept pressing buttons, testing out the new tablet. It was a lot less delayed than the one he used a few years ago, and with much less static. The video feed was a lot sharper, and almost every little detail was visible.

Fritz took a deep breath. "Okay. I think I'm ready."

Scott smiled. "Okay. Good luck." He turned and walked down the hallway. Fritz stared at the back of his head until he faded into darkness.

 _I guess I'm on my own now,_ the security guard thought. He immediately turned his attention to the tablet in his hands. He flicked through the rooms, half expecting to see evil animatronics every time he accessed a new camera.

After about ten minutes, he began to relax. There were no more evil animatronics. There were just the robots he and Zoe had built and programmed. Everything would be fine.

 _ **xXx**_

Goldie sighed as he walked out of the kitchen. He looked around the dark, empty restaurant as he trudged past Pirate's Cove and through the Game Area. The pizzeria looked strange at night, with everything coated in darkness. The only lights in the room were the small red ones on the security cameras.

He was just about to turn down the hallway when the tiny light on the camera next to the Game Area started blinking. The dormant camera suddenly straightened. Another lens on the camera switched on like a flashlight, and that portion of the room was filled with light. It began slowly rotating, examining every inch of the area it was in.

Goldie thought for a moment. He might as well warn Fritz that he was coming. He wouldn't want his dad to freak out and think he was an evil animatronic.

He shrugged and walked over to the camera. He was almost within its line of sight when the light shut off and the camera lowered again, its lens to the floor. About a second later, the camera switched on once again and the small flashlight brightened the area once again. Unfortunately, Goldie was closer to the camera now, and the light seared his eyes. He felt the gears in his head stop for a moment, and he was frozen in place. He wanted to move, but his servos seemed to have locked up. The light shut off once more, and Goldie twitched as his mind began working again. His mind was in Nighttime Mode, and the light flashing right in his eyes had confused him for a moment. The light had made his brain switch from Night Mode to Daytime Mode, even though the rest of him protested, trying to remind him that it was the middle of the night.

Goldie blinked from the confusion of having his mind switch modes so quickly. He regained his composure and continued on his way, peering down the hall. The one camera near the entrance didn't seem to be on, and he slowly crept down the hall. He tried not to make too much noise, as he didn't want Fritz to figure out he was in there. He didn't want a repeat of what just happened. Besides, when the camera was on (or at least the flashlight), he wouldn't be able to tell him he was coming anyway. Fritz probably already figured that out on his own, anyway, as he'd seen him in the Game Area.

The floor creaked slightly every time his feet touched the ground. Goldie stared at the bare walls as he walked. He'd seen a couple pictures of the pizzeria before the fire in a couple old newspapers Tonnie and Mangle found in Vincent's room, and in every picture, there had been posters on the walls, along with messy drawings made by little kids. These walls had only a simple black and white checkered pattern.

Behind him, the light from the camera flickered to life, and he whirled around. He didn't mean to, but he just kind of did it without thinking. There was a word for that, right? Instinct, wasn't it? He kept forgetting words when he thought about them, and it was seriously frustrating at times.

As soon as the light hit his eyes, his mind switched out of Nighttime Mode again, leaving him confused. He was rendered completely immobile as the flashlight beam swept across the area.

The light turned off, and Goldie was able to move again. He was starting to get angry. Fritz should have recognized him, and yet he kept doing this. Didn't he see that it was messing with his system? Couldn't he tell that it was starting to irritate him- _a lot_?

He quickly dashed to the end of the hall, ending up at the entrance to another one. This one, however, had four rooms branching off from it, two on each wall. He ignored the Parts and Service room and dashed down the corridor. Fritz must have heard him, because a flashlight switched on from the end of the corridor. Goldie still wasn't prepared for this, and he was left motionless again. This time, the light didn't shut off after a little while. Instead, it flicked on and off, which was really starting to screw up his mind. He twitched violently as his brain started to overheat. If this kept up, it could literally have exploded.

Finally, the light shut off for good. He shook his head vigourously, trying to focus. He could just duck into one of the side rooms and avoid the flashlight. _But there are probably cameras in those rooms, too,_ he thought, then shrugged to himself. He could just keep going down the hall. Though, when Zoe had shown him a map of the place, he did remember there being vents in the two rooms closest to the office...

He nodded as he continued down the hall. That would be the best way to the office. Surely there weren't cameras in there, let alone flashlights. He jogged lightly towards the far room on his right. Unfortunately, the light was suddenly on again. The twitching episode pursued, and as soon as he was mobile again, Goldie stumbled into the room with the vent. His mind couldn't take much more of this, and he was quite mad. Didn't Fritz see that it was him? He wasn't that hard to see! Surely Fritz knew that it was just him!

A click sounded from behind him, down the hallway. Goldie snickered. Seeing the now empty hallway must've had Fritz freaking out. He wasn't even trying to get Fritz so he could comfort BB anymore. Now he just wanted to freak Fritz out.

Also... Goldie really wanted to get into the office. He wasn't sure why, though. Before, his list of goals had been like this:

1: Get Fritz.  
2: Explain that BB had a nightmare.  
3: Get back to the kitchen with Fritz so he could calm BB down.  
4: Do it all without turning into an evil animatronic.

Now it looked more like this:

1: Get to the office.  
2: Freak out his dad.  
3: Possibly, _maybe_ kill him? Maybe?

He was still questioning that last one.

But then the camera, along with the light, switched on in the room, and Goldie changed his mind about the last thing.

He _really_ wanted to kill him.

The light flickered off, and Goldie snarled. Why did Fritz keep doing that? He shouldn't have been worried! It was just him! Just Goldie! It wasn't like he was going to-

...

He was going to...

...

He...

...

...

...

Was he really?

Goldie gasped. He stumbled backwards, away from the vent he hadn't realized he was just about to enter. He wouldn't go into the office. He _couldn't_. If he really ended up killing, or even slightly injuring his dad, he would never forgive himself.

Goldie crept back out into the hallway. He suddenly remembered why he was there in the first place. He took a deep breath and peeked around the corner, into the office. Fritz was staring down at a tablet in his hands. He was sweating, and his hands were trembling. Goldie felt a pang of guilt. He was the reason his dad looked so terrified.

The light behind Goldie switched on; Fritz must've been looking through that camera to see if he was still there. Suddenly, the light flicked off and Fritz flung the tablet onto the desk in front of him and snatched a flashlight from the wooden surface. He fumbled with it for a moment, and Goldie reached towards his dad. "Wait, Da-!"

He was cut off by a bright beam of light aimed directly at his face. Goldie's mouth froze mid-sentence, his eyes wide, his arm outstretched.

Fritz panicked and began switching the light on and off, once again plunging Goldie into a spazz attack. He began twitching violently, Fortunately, Fritz snapped out of his panic and dropped the flashlight. Goldie twitched one final time before stumbling sideways into the wall. His software was completely messed up, and it took every ounce of his willpower to stay conscious.

He heard Fritz let out a breath of relief. "Oh god. Goldie, don't do that! You nearly gave me a heart attack!" He paused. "Goldie? You okay, kiddo?"

Goldie felt a pair of hands grab his own, and then he was sitting in the chair Fritz had been in before. He grimaced and looked up, blinking. "Yeah. I think I'm fine."

Fritz sighed and grabbed Goldie's head, moving it around and looking for injuries. After a few moments of this, Goldie grabbed Fritz's wrists and pushed him away. "Whoa, Dad, what are you doing?"

The security guard sighed. "Sorry. You just looked really creepy on those cameras. I was probably just hallucinating, but I just wanted to make sure you were okay."

Goldie was confused. He tilted his head. "How exactly did I look?"

Fritz shrugged. "Well," he started, but he seemed at a loss for words. Instead of explaining, he turned around and picked up the tablet. He pressed a few buttons, and began speaking. "I managed to get a picture of you while you were at the vent. I was trying to switch cameras, but my hands were shaking so much, I accidentally pressed the screenshot button."

He held the tablet out to Goldie, who took it hesitantly. He forced his eyes to the screen, afraid of what he might see.

He was definitely right to be afraid.

The creature on the camera was so horrible, he almost screamed. It looked a lot like him, with the same structure, face, and clothing, more or less. But this thing's hair was a dark, muddy brown, covered in filth. His usual clean suit was now in tatters, rips and holes dotting the once yellow jacket, which was now so covered in a grimy layer of oil and dirt that it looked more brown than yellow. The tan metal that usually covered him as skin was torn away in some places, revealing the silver endoskeleton beneath. All of the metal joints were completely bare, causing his arms to dangle towards the ground, his legs bent at odd angles. He had on his purple top hat and bow tie, and they were a lighter colour than normal. His hands were tipped with needle-like claws, which barely touched the ground.

But the most disturbing part was his face.

Goldie's normally brown eyes were pitch black, like empty eye sockets, though there was a slight red glow in the center of them both. Wires protruded from his skull and hung out of his eyes, some of them almost reaching his shoulders. His mouth hung open incredibly wide, like someone had cut open his cheeks and disconnected his jaw from the rest of his face. His teeth were razor sharp, and he seemed to have two rows of them instead of just one.

Goldie shook his head vigourously and handed the tablet back to Fritz. "That's _not_ me," he declared.

Fritz gave a sigh of relief. "Oh, good. You see it too. I thought maybe I was just hallucinating." Then he took the tablet and pressed a few more buttons. "And I'm afraid it _is_ you. I accidentally got another picture of you just before you came in here." He turned the device around to show the picture to Goldie. This one was of a normal Goldie, no hat or tie, normal crumpled suit, normal eyes.

Goldie reached out and began swiping across the tablet, wanting to see the first picture again for comparison. Instead, he found a picture of the vacant Prize Corner. He furrowed his brow and continued swiping. There were a lot of other pictures of empty rooms. He raised an eyebrow at his dad.

The guard sighed. "I was really nervous, okay? I kept pressing the wrong buttons. Vincent should really get Mike to do this job instead, or even do it himself. They're both a lot braver than I am. You were also swiping the wrong way." He reached over and slid his finger across the screen until it was back at the first photo.

They both stared at the tablet and switched between pictures, comparing them for similarities. Finally, Goldie sighed and leaned back in the chair. "How did this happen?" he asked, partially to himself.

His dad shrugged. "I dunno. The only reason I can think of is that a demon has been possessing you for the past few days and it's finally starting to show signs of complete takeover of your body." Goldie raised his eyebrows in confusion, and Fritz shrugged. "I read a lot of horror and fantasy stories."

Goldie gave a nervous laugh. "You're so weird."

 **i literally want to go back in time and fucking slap my past self in the face for making this chapter ending shitty**


	17. Chapter 17

**SHOUT OUTS: HunterHero179 (why would you want Goldie to kill him? Just curious), Scarlet Firesong (pizzaria?), Fate12343 (thank you :D), EddyTheBunny for favouriting and following me and the story, and frozem1 for favouriting and following the story!**

 **Chapter 17**

Zoe grunted as she picked up a large cardboard box. "God, this is heavy. What's in here?"

Her friend Raina shrugged. "I don't know. Let me see," she said as she walked over to her. She rummaged through the box for a moment, then, with great effort, heaved an old computer out of the box. "Huh. That's where that went." She set it down on the floor of her garage and picked up a long pink coat that was similar to Foxy's. "Do you think Mangle will like this?"

Zoe glanced at it and nodded, setting down the empty box and shoving a bunch of headbands with animal ears inside. They were at Raina's house, which was a couple blocks away from Zoe's own home. She worked at a clothing store on Main Street, and her shift had just ended.

Mike, Jeremy, and Zoe all went to high school with her. The four of them were all friends, and they'd given each other all nicknames. Mike was Mickey, Jeremy was Jerebear, Zoe was Supernova, and Raina was Rainbow. There were reasons behind their nicknames. Mike was Mickey because he dressed up as Mickey Mouse every Halloween until he was ten. Zoe's had come partially from her last name, and partially from the fact that she'd wanted to be astronaut when she was eleven. But then she had found out how much training they had to go through, and she became a mechanic instead. Jeremy's nickname was Jerebear because when he was little, Freddy had been his favourite animatronic at the restaurant, which was only because bears had been his favourite animal. Once, he'd dressed up as a bear for Halloween. Raina's full name was Raina Bowman, and when the four of them first met each other at some other kid's birthday party when they were all four, Mike had mispronounced her name and called her "Rainbow" instead. She was really happy all the time, and wore a variety of colours, most of which never matched. So the nickname kind of stuck. Raina had dark brown hair that was cut in a cute bob. Her eyes were a pretty shade of green that stood out against her olive skin. She always wore elaborate outfits, and she mostly made her own. At the moment, she was wearing bright green leggings with a blue cardigan, a pink miniskirt, and a ruffly white tanktop, plus a pair of bright orange ballet flats.

The previous day, after the swarm of fangirls had barged into the pizzeria, Raina and Zoe went shopping for new outfits for the robots. A lot of their clothing had rips and tears in them, so they went out and bought them three new outfits each- one for work, another for casual wear, and pajamas. Sure, they could've just sewed up the few holes in their clothes, but Zoe thought they deserved a little reward for putting up with those crazy fans.

Raina grabbed a bunch of outfits wrapped in plastic. "Let's get these to the pizzeria."

 ** _xXx_**

Vincent sighed as he stuck a cigarette in his mouth and lit it. He hadn't gotten much sleep last night. That Fredbear robot had caused quite a commotion last night. Not to mention the nightmares that had plagued him every night since that Nova girl had rebuilt those wretched automatons.

He rolled his eyes at himself as he pulled his hair back and secured it with an elastic. He shouldn't have been thinking about the nightmares. Everything that happened in them had occurred for real in the past, and he hated looking back on those days. He thought back to when he was younger, and had just been hired as a mechanic to build new animatronics-

"STOP- THINKING- ABOUT- THAT," he ordered himself, smacking his head on his mirror with each syllable. But try as he might, the memories wouldn't leave him be. They never did.

He was interrupted in his self-pity by an unfamiliar, sing-song voice. "DO NOT BE ALARMED, ROBOTS! I COME BEARING GIFTS!"

Vincent raised an eyebrow, all thoughts of his past driven out by confusion. "The fuck...?" he whispered, striding over to his half-open door. He shouldered it open and walked out into the main party room. Before he saw anything, however, a bright gold thing rushed past him and accidentally clipped his shoulder. Vincent inhaled sharply as a piece of metal pierced through his skin. He quickly clapped a hand to his shoulder to hide it.

"I'm sorry," a voice apologized frantically. "I wasn't watching where I was going. Are you okay?"

Vincent looked up and saw Goldie. He almost snapped at the robot: "Well what do you think? Do you not see the blood gushing from my shoulder?" (Although in truth it didn't hurt that much, as he'd gotten used to the pain after so many years. He was just in a really bad mood that morning.) The words were almost out of his mouth when he caught a glimpse of the robot's dark brown eyes. Suddenly, in the automaton's place was a little boy, looking to be around four or five years of age. He had a black and grey striped shirt and an old Fredbear plush clutched in his arms.

"Hey, what's wrong? Why are looking at me like that?"

Vincent shook his head vigourously until the old memory was gone. Goldie stood in front of him with a concerned look on his face.

Vincent gave Goldie a false smile and walked past him.

 _ **xXx**_

Goldie walked out of the security office, his thoughts whirling in his mind. As soon as Fritz had left to deal with BB, Goldie had sat down in the office chair and flipped back and forth between the two pictures. He'd been quite confused at first, trying to find out why he had looked like that in the first one. Minutes had turned to hours, and he began to get more and more frustrated. Needless to say, he'd stayed in the office the entire rest of the night, not getting any more sleep than he had before.

Now he was walking down the hallway towards the main party room, completely exhausted. He looked up at the camera in Party Room 2. The camera lay dormant now, but he still cringed. Goldie lowered his gaze and hurried past it. Before he got to the end, however, he crashed into something. He stumbled backwards and shook his head. The automaton looked up and saw Vincent with a surprised look on his face. Blood was leaking from his shoulder.

Goldie smiled apologetically. "I'm sorry. I wasn't watching where I was going. Are you okay?"

Vincent turned around, a scowl forming on his face, looking as though he were about to yell. Then he suddenly gasped, his eyes widening. He stayed that way until Goldie gave a nervous laugh. "Hey, what's wrong? Why are looking at me like that?"

Vincent blinked and shook his head. Goldie continued to look at him. Then Vincent gave Goldie a smile that was most definitely fake and walked away from the robot without a word.

He was quite confused. Goldie had no idea what had just happened, but he was shaken out of his daze when he saw the commotion going on in the main room. A person in a riduculous multi-coloured outfit was running around, trying to put a set of purple bunny ears on Bonnie's head while Zoe, Mike, and Jeremy were laughing like crazy. Some of the other humanimatronics were standing around, half of them with animal ears on their heads. Teddy had an orange pair of cute round bear ears on his head, and he definitely didn't look happy about it. Chica and Tia both had fake yellow wings strapped to their backs, and were running around, pretending to fly. Well, Tia was. Chica was just sitting on one of the tables, having a giggling fit while she watched Tia crash into walls. Mangle was hanging from the ceiling as though it were a set of monkey bars, and Tonnie was standing on a table, trying to get up as well, but he fell to the floor every time. For some reason, Mangle had on a bubblegum pink pirate coat, similar to Foxy's. Foxy had stolen Freddy's hat and animal ears, and was now running around the restaurant with them on, screaming random words such as "RUBBISH!" and 'BLOODY HELL!" in a terribly exaggerated British accent. Freddy was running after him, yelling words that definitely weren't complimentary towards the pirate fox.

Goldie blinked. This was even more chaotic than the day they'd been activated.

Then the new person suddenly appeared in front of Goldie and took off his hat. She set a yellow headband with little bear ears on them onto his head and shoved his hat back on him and ran away before he even realized what happened.

He sighed. Today was going to be a long day.


	18. Chapter 18

**merry christmas**

 **SHOUT OUTS: frozem1 (I'm a little confused by this I seriously have no idea what you're asking), StormCloud666 (YAS), Kiwi-Plays-Games (awesome XD ), Wolf of Epicness for following and favouriting me and the story, JmpingJellyBean for favouriting the story, Redolive for following and favouriting me, MaximumRide159 for following the story, and darkraizerGx1 for following and favouriting the story!**

 **Chapter 18**

Foxy walked out of the stall in the bathroom and looked in the mirror above the sinks. _These fox ears look ridiculous,_ he thought, tugging on the collar of his new shirt. He wiggled his feet, trying to get them into a comfortable position in his boots. Another stall door opened, and out stepped Freddy. His outfit didn't look too different from his old one, aside from the fact that he was wearing a waistcoat instead of a jacket.

Freddy looked in the mirror beside Foxy. "Well, at least I look better than you," he commented, pulling the cuffs of his sleeves over his brown wrists.

Foxy held his hook up to the light. "I wonder how painful it would be if I gouged this in your eye," he asked himself, his pirate brogue butchering the words.

The threat had no effect on Freddy. "Oh please." He rolled his eyes, straightening his hat. "You know we can't feel pain."

Foxy snarled and was about to respond, but Teddy and Bonnie both stepped out of their own stalls at that moment. They were staring down at their outfits in distaste.

Teddy stared at his orange and yellow striped waistcoat. "Do I seriously have to wear this?" he growled.

BB opened another stall and skipped out of the bathroom, obviously in a good mood. He still had his little pinwheel hat, but his shirt now had longer sleeves, along with white buttons instead of purple. His outfit wasn't that different, but he apparently loved it.

"He's so cute," Mangle commented as BB pranced out of the room.

"You should be more like him," Tonnie told his brother.

Bonnie rolled his eyes. "Well I'm not a ten-year-old, so I'm not going to act like one."

Goldie sighed as he walked out of his stall. He glanced at his image in the glass, then looked away and left the bathroom.

"What's wrong with him?" Foxy asked, purposefully putting a rude, sarcastic tone in his voice.

Freddy shrugged. "I'm not sure. Maybe one of us should ask him."

Silence.

Foxy shook his head and left the bathroom. "Well, whoever does it, it's not going to be me."

 _ **xXx**_

 ***Thirty minutes later***

Zoe knelt and gave BB a hug. "Good luck today, kiddo. Remember, I'm just in one of the party rooms if you need me. Okay?"

BB smiled. "Okay."

Zoe ruffled his hair and handed him a bunch of balloons. "You're going to be in the Game Area with Mari. If anything goes wrong, just tell her or come find me."

BB rolled his eyes, though he was smiling. "Yeah, yeah, I know. You've said this a thousand times. I know what I'm doing."

"I know," Zoe replied. "I just don't want what happened yesterday to repeat itself. Now remember-"

"Don't annoy anyone, don't try to beat anyone up, and be careful when speaking to people I don't recognize," BB finished. "Mom, relax. Everything is going to be fine."

Zoe sighed. "I know. I just worry." She stood up. "Okay. Have fun, kiddo." She walked off down the hallway.

BB stared after her, then turned forwards to look at the doors. He took a deep breath. He may have convinced Zoe that he'd be okay, but he hadn't been able to convince himself.

Suddenly, a loud screeching sound resonated through the restaurant. BB yelped and covered his ears, letting go of the balloons.

The screeching faded, and BB looked up at the stage, where the sound had come from. Bonnie was standing on the stage, a red guitar in his hands. The guitar had a wire protruding from it, the other end connected to some weird machine.

Bonnie laughed. "Awesome."

Freddy rolled his eyes as he grabbed a wire from his microphone and plugged it into the machine. "You're supposed to be practicing, not fooling around."

"Practicing what?" Bonnie scoffed, then struck at the strings on his guitar again, releasing another ear-splitting screech.

Vincent shot Bonnie a glare from the table he was sitting at, and the robot fell silent. Vincent nodded, satisfied, then un-clipped a walkie-talkie from his belt. He pressed a button then spoke into it. "Are all the guards in their places?"

"Yep," a voice said from the device. It was Jeremy's voice. "I'm right outside the front doors."

"I must say," said another voice, which sounded like Zoe's, "it seems rather undignified for you of all people to be using a walkie-talkie. This isn't something I'd expect from you, Vincent."

Vincent rolled his eyes. "It was Scott's idea," he said. "Now, are you at your station or not?"

A sigh. "Yes. I'm in the office."

Silence.

Vincent spoke again. "Mike?"

Suddenly, a loud _bang_ and a string of cuss words emanated from the device, most of which BB couldn't hear because Chica had come up behind him and covered his ears. As soon as the cursing faded out, Chica removed her hands from his head.

Vincent facepalmed. "What did you do?"

More swearing, and Chica covered BB's ears again.

"Shut up. Now are you in Pirate's Cove?"

More cussing.

Vincent turned off the walkie-talkie and clipped it back onto his belt. "I'll take that as a yes." He turned to Springtrap, who was standing right next to the doors. "Open the doors."

Springtrap hesitated. She looked out at the street. There was a small crowd waiting outside, and BB spotted a few of the fangirls in their midst.

"Are you sure?" she asked, nervously adjusting her greenish-yellow vest.

Vincent heaved a sigh. "Just open the goddamn door."

Springtrap shrugged and unlocked the doors.

The result was almost as bad than the fangirls.

Kids swarmed into the restaurant like bees, crowding around the animatronics and yelling. Children crawled up on the stage, and Freddy went down in a sea of kids. Bonnie had his back to the wall and was warding them off with his guitar, and Chica was trying unsuccessfully to hide behind her drum set. Teddy and Tonnie all got attacked by little toddlers. Tia seemed to be the only one in the room who could control the children. A bunch of them dashed into Pirate's Cove, and a few others ran down the hallway. A large group headed towards Mari, who yelped and hopped into a large box that looked like a present. She closed the flaps and kids crowded around it, screaming and smacking the sides with their tiny palms. Many of the older kids, looking to be around seven to eleven years old, either stayed with their parents or found their friends and sat down at tables.

BB looked around. Not many of the kids were coming towards him, possibly because they thought he was just another one of them. Only a few came at him, and that was just to ask him if he could get the balloons down from the ceiling. Unfortunately, he wasn't tall enough, and when the kids realized this, they simply pouted and left.

There didn't seem to anyone else coming towards him, so he shrugged and sat down on the floor. The kids only seemed interested in annoying the robots that seemed to be adults and teenagers, not other kids.

Since he didn't have his balloons at the moment, and there was no way he'd be able to calm these kids down by himself, there really wasn't much for him to do there. He stood up and started walking to the kitchen. When he passed Pirate's Cove, he heard children shrieking and Mike and Foxy swearing at the tops of their lungs. BB was glad he didn't have to deal with those kids.

Suddenly, a voice called out: "Hey, Balloon Bitch!"

BB turned around, and his heart leaped into his throat when he saw four teenage girls. He didn't recognize them from the day before, but he couldn't be sure.

There was also the matter of that word they had called him. He heard Mike yelling it from Pirate's Cove seconds before, and from the way the security guard had said it, BB was fairly sure it was not complimentary. BB didn't know what it meant, however, so he did a quick Google search in his mind. When the results appeared, he raised his eyebrows. Why would she be calling him a female dog? Then he saw the second definition and understood. So it _was_ an insult.

Nevertheless, this word didn't faze him. If anyone was a "difficult or unpleasant situation or thing", it was these four.

BB crossed his arms. "What are you doing here? This is a restaurant for kids."

One of the girls, one with brown hair dyed blond at the tips, shrugged. "Oh well. Just show us where Foxy is."

BB almost laughed. If these girls were really fans of Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, they would have known that he'd be in Pirate's Cove. He's a pirate fox. Where else would he be? These girls had probably heard from the fangirls that the animatronics were human now, and had decided to see for themselves.

"He's in the kitchen," BB said, gesturing towards the door next to the stage. "I was just going to go check up on him, but since you want to see him anyway, you can do it for me."

Two of the girls looked at each other and squealed. Another one with bright blue and purple glasses looked at the door and headed towards it, gesturing for her friends to follow. BB turned away before they found that Foxy wasn't actually in the kitchen.

 **another shitty chapter ending i'm sorry i hat my past self**


	19. Chapter 19

**happy new years ya lil shits**

 **SHOUT OUTS: xEnderAwesomex (sorry I missed your last couple of reviews. My gmail is being annoying), frozem1 (okay), HunterHero179 (yas :D), AVFireBlade9472 (okay), and Oceasia for following and favouriting the story (OKAY WHAT ABOUT THE SCARS AND THE NOVEL?!).**

 **Chapter 19**

Chica emerged from her bathroom stall in a yellow t-shirt and a denim skirt. "That was insane," she commented, tying her hair back in a ponytail.

Tia nodded as she fixed her own blonde hair in a bun. "I know. I had no idea kids could be so..." She paused, thinking for the right word.

"Annoying?" Springtrap suggested.

"Weird?" Mari offered.

"Crazy?"

"Loud?"

Tia nodded. "Yeah. That." She pulled on the pink jacket she had been given earlier that day, then waved to Chica. "Come on. Let's go help Uncle Mike clean up the Game Area."

Chica and Tia left the bathroom, and Springtrap sighed. "I should probably go with them. The restaurant _is_ a pretty big mess." She walked to the door, then looked back at Mari. "You wanna come?"

Mari hesitated. "Yeah, I'll be along in a minute."

Springtrap gave her friend a smile and a nod, then opened the door. As soon as it closed, Mari sighed and sank to the ground. It was about two o'clock p.m., meaning that the day more than half over. In about eight more hours, Zoe would send them to bed. Everyone would fall asleep, one by one. Mari would be the last one to fall asleep, as usual. Then she would awake a while later, panicking.

For BB and Goldie were not the only ones being plagued with nightmares. And hers were much, _much_ worse.

 _ **xXx**_

Vincent flopped facedown on his bed, his face buried in the pillow. He didn't bother to put a bandage on his leg, which was now bleeding. He also hadn't eaten lunch or even breakfast, but he wasn't really in the mood for eating. Besides, all there was at the restaurant was fast food, and Vincent didn't know how to cook anything else except toast, but he wasn't even in the mood for that.

He wasn't quite sure what had happened in the hallway, when the Fredbear robot had changed. He was hallucinating. That was the only logical explanation. He was hallucinating about what had happened in 1987, as well as having nightmares about it. Maybe all the guilt from what he'd done was finally getting to him, and he was starting to go insane. That was the only explanation.

 _But it had looked so real,_ a small voice in his head protested.

But it wasn't.

 _He even had the little gold bear in his arms, like he always did._

But the bear was still in Vincent's room.

 _But what if it's not?_

It had probably been the fact that Goldie looked a lot like his animatronic counterpart that conjured up the image of the bear.

 _What about the story of the kids?_

He didn't want to think about that.

 _The kids' souls were trapped in the suits they were stuffed in._

Vincent didn't care.

 _His soul is probably inside Goldie._

"Stop it," Vincent said aloud.

 _You could talk to him._

"No."

 _He might remember what happened._

"STOP."

 _It could all be how it was before the Bite._

'STOP IT."

 _Just try._

"SHUT UP!"

 _What have you got to lose, anyway?_

...

Silence.


	20. Chapter 20

**SHOUT OUTS: frozem1 (thanks), Fate12343 (THANK YOU), ZombieSlayers (oh. Wow. Well, not that it'll help your sanity much, but here's a virtual hug. *hugs*), Oceasia (OKAY MY HEAD JUST EXPLODED I HAVEN'T READ THE BOOK YET BECAUSE MY PARENTS WON'T BUY IT FOR ME WHICH IS SAD BUT HOLY CRAP I JUST), MangelPirate (no, I did not get this story from the internet, but thanks!), CM9813, Nightprincess123 and Shadescribe for following the story, Maddox for favouriting and following the story, NorthStar2003 and MangelPirate for favouriting and following me and the story, and StarCre8tion for following and favouriting the story.**

 **Chapter 20**

Zoe grimaced as she tapped the dents out of Goldie's head. "Gosh, those kids sure beat you up."

"One of them smacked me with a chair," he muttered.

Zoe stepped away from the automaton. "Alright. You're all fixed up."

Goldie stuck his hat on top of his head. "Thanks."

"Your turn, Spring!" Zoe called to Springtrap as Goldie walked out of the Parts and Service room.

Goldie's mind began to wander as he made his way to the kitchen to retrieve his new everyday outfit. He was worried about the nightmares he kept having. What would happen in tonight's dream? Would he die by the hands of that horrendous monster on the chair once again, or would he be back in the house with the little golden bear plushie? He was secretly wishing for the one with the bear, for two reasons: one, he was curious as to what might happen next, and two, he wouldn't be alone.

He reached the kitchen and pushed open the doors, making a beeline for his sleeping bag. He was getting sick of sleeping on the floor. He'd read about things called "beds", which were couch-like pieces of furniture that people slept on at night. Maybe eventually he would be able to sleep in one like a real person, instead of on the cold floor of the kitchen.

Goldie ran off to the bathroom and changed into his new outfit. He walked out of his bathroom stall and looked in the mirror above the sink. The denim jeans on his legs scratched against his skin (well, technically it was metal, but he was used to calling it skin), but he didn't feel any discomfort, what with him not having nerves. The large violet t-shirt hung off his slight frame. Upon seeing this colour, he involuntarily thought of the first nightmare he had, the day after they'd been created. Seeing the four, large animatronics walking down that dark hallway, following them, the flash of purple he'd seen, and then the fire, the terrified expression of the man in the purple suit, and then soon after, he heard the loud, tortured screams of the man, who had seemed to be in great pain-

Goldie twitched. Thinking of that nightmare was making his software bug out. It was almost exactly like the effect that flashlight had on him, forcing his software to try and solve the problem as it thought it should. Right now, it thought that maybe these nightmares were because of a bug in the programming or the damage he'd taken from the kids and fangirls. It was getting overheated, and it decided to freeze all non-vital functions in his mind until it could get things sorted out. That meant he couldn't see, couldn't hear, and couldn't move. All he could do was breathe.

He wasn't sure how long he stood there. He lost track of time as his software ran through the images of the nightmare, trying to sort things out.

Goldie wasn't sure how much time passed when he finally came back to his senses. He had collapsed in a heap on the floor. He blinked, trying to focus, but all he could see was a purple blob. He could also hear something, but be couldn't quite tell what it was.

It took a minute for him to be able to see and hear clearly again, and when he could, he was quite surprised.

"Goldie? Are you all right?" Vincent asked. "Goldie? What happened?"

Goldie shook his head. "Um, my software just spazzed out. Probably from the damage those kids did. It's nothing."

Vincent stood up and offered Goldie his hand. Goldie took it, and Vincent hauled him to his feet.

"Are you sure you're okay?" Vincent asked again. Goldie was surprised to hear what sounded like genuine concern in his voice.

The robot nodded as he dusted off his clothes. "Yeah. I'm fine." Goldie looked up at him and was struck by a sudden feeling of recognition. Yes, of course he had seen Vincent around the restaurant before, but somehow it seemed like he'd seen Vincent before Zoe had built them. But that was impossible, because he hadn't been alive before that.

"Anyway," Vincent said, interrupting his thoughts. "I kind of need to talk to you."

Goldie raised an eyebrow. "About what?"

Vincent hesitated, then shrugged. "Just- You did a good job at work today."

Goldie knew that wasn't what he had actually wanted to talk about, but he didn't want to force him into speaking, so he smiled. "Thanks." He turned around and walked out of the bathroom.

 _ **xXx**_

Foxy sighed and leaned against the wall in Pirate's Cove. "Those bloody kids," he muttered as he polished his hook with his sleeve. "Can't believe we're going to have to deal with them every day."

Bonnie nodded and tossed his bunny ears into the foam pit in the center of the room. "Yeah. That was fucking unreal."

"Humans are weird," Teddy agreed. He raised his arm to adjust his jacket, and his shoulder creaked while doing so. He grimaced. "Do you guys know if Zoe is still here? I've been meaning to ask her to about my shoulder. It's turning a kind of reddish brownish colour, and I don't know why."

Foxy shrugged, holding his hook up to the light to examine it. "I think she's in the Parts and Service room."

Teddy nodded. "Thanks," he said, getting up from his spot on the floor. He walked through the open curtains and headed off towards the hallway. As he did so, Goldie walked from the hallway and accidentally bumped into Teddy. Goldie mumbled a quick apology, then sat down at one of the tables.

A feeling of sorrow immediately washed over Foxy. Looking at Goldie, he felt like he'd done something... wrong. Like he should be apologizing for something, even though he was fairly sure that he hadn't actually done anything. He'd barely interacted with Goldie at all since they had been made a few weeks ago, so there wasn't really anything to apologize for, wasn't there? But that could have actually been the problem. Maybe he felt guilty that he hadn't spoken to Goldie as much as he should have been. They were technically brothers, after all. And weren't brothers supposed to actually talk to each other?

Foxy shook his head and turned away. He didn't like this emotion. It was like a strange, hollow feeling in his stomach that wouldn't go away.

He suddenly realized that Bonnie had been talking and moved his attention to what he was saying.

"-and his bright clothing just ticks me off for some reason," Bonnie said, oblivious to Foxy's discomfort. "He's always so happy, and it's just annoying."

Foxy nodded, trying to seem like he had been listening the whole time. He wasn't quite sure who Bonnie was griping about, but he assumed it was Tonnie, whom everyone considered Bonnie's actual brother. Sure, they were all made by Zoe, but everyone just acted like the originals and the Toys were related to each other more than the others were, like Foxy with Mangle, Tia with Chica, and Freddy with Teddy.

Bonnie continued talking, and Foxy joined in, complaining about Mangle's own bright outfits and cheerful personality. His heart wasn't really in it, however. He was still thinking of Goldie, and what disastrous thing he could possibly have done to the golden automaton.


	21. Chapter 21

**OKAY I'VE ALREADY FIGURED OUT HOW I WANT THIS STORY TO END HOLY SHIT IT'S GONNA BE SAD BUT WHATEVER I'M FCUKING EXCITED FOR THIS**

 **also i think i might be a guy or maybe a demiboy but idk**

 **im thinking of changing my name to either daniel or sebastian but im really leaning towards daniel**

 **SHOUT OUTS: Kitten (thanks :D), ZombieSlayers (thank u too :D), frozem1 (yeah, google translate doesn't really work well), AVFireBlade9472 (thx :D), StarCre8tion (thank you :D), The Purple Gal (I LOVE TIMBITS THEY'RE SO GOOD), and Pokemonmaster223 and alexa03kitty for following the story!**

 **Chapter 21**

Fritz settled into his chair in the security guard's office. It was just about midnight, almost time for his shift. He thought about what happened last time with Goldie and shivered. He hoped that wouldn't happen this time.

He glanced down at his watch just as it ticked from 11:59 to 12:00. The security guard took a deep breath and turned on the tablet in front of him. Soon after, the phone on the desk rang. He held the tablet in one hand and picked up the phone with the other. "Hey Scott."

"Hey Fritz," the voice on the other end replied. "So, how did it go yesterday?"

"It was fine," Fritz said. He decided not to mention what had happened with Goldie. He knew that if he said anything, Scott would tell Vincent, and then they might want to shut down the robots, and without them, they would have to shut down the restaurant, and then he and the other guards would be left with no job. So he had made the decision to keep it a secret.

"Were there any problems at all?" Scott asked.

Fritz hesitated. "No. Nothing."

"Okay then. So, you know what you're doing?"

"Yep. I'll be fine."

"Alright. See ya on the flip side."

"Bye." Fritz hung up and turned his full attention to the cameras. He was sure nothing like last time would happen, but he wanted to be prepared, just in case.

 _ **xXx**_

Mari sighed and turned over in her sleeping bag. She glanced up at the clock on the wall and saw that it was already midnight. Everyone else had already fallen asleep, but Mari kept thinking about the nightmares she was having lately. She hadn't mentioned them to anyone.

She stared up at the clock for a few more minutes, comforted by the constant ticking noise. Her eyes began to close, and she was just about asleep when she heard a sudden noise from the other side of the room. Her eyes snapped open and she sat up, looking around. The noise sounded again, along with a dim flare of light. Mari pushed her sleeping bag off her and stood up, making her way over to the source of the sound. It was coming from Goldie. Sparks were flying off the joints on his body, and he kept twitching at random.

Mari knelt down and shook his shoulder. "Hey. Goldie," she whispered. "Goldie, wake up."

He squirmed away from her touch and turned over, the sparks popping more frequently now. This was starting to concern Mari. What was happening? Was his software glitching? Was he overheating?

Mari grabbed his arm and shook it. "Goldie," she whispered. "Wake up!"

Goldie's eyes fluttered open, and the sparking stopped. He yawned. "What?" His eyes whirred as they focused on her like a camera lens. "Mari? Why are you still awake?"

She shrugged. "I couldn't sleep. And you kept sparking and twitching, so I thought maybe your software was overheating or something."

He sighed. "Whatever. I'm going back to sleep." He laid down and turned on his side, his back to Mari.

Mari sighed and stood up. If he didn't want to talk about it, she wouldn't force him to. She started walking back to her sleeping bag when she suddenly heard a noise from the kitchen doors.

Her head whipped around towards the noise, trying to see what had made it. Unfortunately, she couldn't see very well because it was so dark. She glanced back at Goldie to see if he had noticed, but he was still. _Maybe he already fell asleep,_ she thought.

She turned back to where the noise was coming from. As she listened, she found that it seemed to have some kind of pattern to it. She took a deep breath and made her way towards it, carefully stepping around the sleeping bodies of her friends. The noise gradually became louder as she got closer to the doors.

She finally made it past the other robots and quickly tiptoed over to the doors. By now she could hear the noise a lot more clearly. It was a kind of twinkling sound, like a piano or something, with a quiet ticking noise in the backround. She reached the doors, but there was nothing there. _Maybe it's coming from outside the doors,_ she thought. _Should I go check?_

Mari thought for a moment, debating with herself, then sighed and pushed the doors open. She glanced at the Show Stage to her right. The camera poised above it was shining a light that illuminated that part of the room. After a few moments, it shut off, and another camera in the Game Area turned on. Mari didn't pay much attention to this, however, because now she could hear the sound clearly.

It was the most beautiful thing she'd ever heard in her so far short life.

It was obviously a song. She thought it was a piano at first, but then she realized that the notes were shorter and more delicate sounding than a piano. This beautiful twinkling was accompanied by a soft, persistent ticking sound, like one of those giant clocks that some people had. She couldn't remember what they were called. Grand-something clocks.

Mari walked towards her Prize Corner, where the song seemed to be coming from. It sounded very calm and inviting. She felt like she could go to sleep right there on the floor of the restaurant, and it would be the best sleep that she ever had.

She reached the Prize Corner, and sitting there on the counter was a small blue wooden box with a metal crank on the side. It looked very plain, nothing special, aside from a few faded, delicate lines painted around it in a darker shade of blue. The crank turned slowly as the song played, and she realized that this must be one of those music boxes she read about in a book just the day before. The camera light next to her shut off, making her unable to see anything, but she didn't care. The music was so enchanting, that she didn't care if she lost her sight forever, as long as she got to continue listening to that mesmerizing song. She was just reaching out towards the place she thought the box was when she heard a small voice:

"Mari?"

She snapped out of her trance and whirled around, ending up face to face with a small boy of about ten years old, his sky blue flannel pyjamas hanging off his small frame. He held a pillow wrapped up in his arms, hugging it to his chest. His big blue eyes stared at her, barely visible but clearly confused.

She shook her head vigourously. The music had stopped. She glanced back at the prize counter and saw the faint light shape of the box. Its crank had stopped turning, just as the music had stopped playing.

She turned back to Balloon Boy. "What are you doing up this late?" she asked, slightly annoyed that the music had stopped upon his arrival.

"I was going to ask you the same thing," he said, clutching his pillow tighter.

 _Fair point_ , she thought. "Well, I heard a noise out here, and I decided to come check it out." It wasn't really a lie. She just wasn't telling the whole truth. "Now why are _you_ up?"

"I saw you leaving, so I decided to come see what you were doing." He tilted his head. "And you know Dad's on security guard duty. Whatever the sound was, he would take care of it."

Mari shrugged. "I was just curious, is all." She put a hand on his shoulder and steered him towards the kitchen. "How about we just go back to bed?"

He hesitated, then nodded. "Okay." They started towards the doors, when they suddenly opened. Both robots jumped in surprise, but then they saw who it was.

Goldie rubbed his eyes as he walked towards them. "What are you guys doing out here?" he asked sleepily.

Mari sighed. "Nothing. I just heard a noise and came to check it out. But it's fine now, so we're going back to bed." She started walking past him, but then the doors opened again and another figure stepped out.

"What in the name of Blackbeard's bloody bones are you all doin' up at this hour?"

Mari recognized the programmed pirate speak immediately. "Go back to bed, Foxy. Everything's fine. We were just coming back in."

"Not until you tell us what you were doing," Goldie said, crossing his arms.

Mari rolled her eyes. "Look, I told you, I just heard a noise and came out here to see what it was. It's no big deal, okay? Besides, why do you want to know?"

Goldie's expression was firm. "I have my reasons. Just tell me."

Foxy rolled his eyes- well, eye. His other was still covered by his eye patch. "Oh, leave it alone Goldie. Just let 'em go alrea-"

His sentence was cut off when the camera from the Prize Corner turned on, along with the flashlight. BB turned towards the camera and waved at it. "Hi, Dad!"

Mari flashed a smile at the camera, glancing back at the music box on the counter. "Sorry we're up so late, Dad. Don't worry, we were just getting back into the kitch-"

She stopped short when she saw the reflection in the camera lens. She whirled around turning to look at Goldie and Foxy. Goldie was standing completely still, staring at the flashlight as though he was paralyzed. Occasionally. He would twitch or spark, but that was the only movement he made.

Foxy on the other hand, was having a giant spazz attack. His eye lens continuously zoomed in and out, as though it were trying to find something to focus on. He was constantly twitching, and sparks flew from his body, turning him into a robotic fireworks show. Smoke curled from his joints, electricity fizzling along his endoskeleton. A few of his screws came loose from all the jolting, and his hook fell off. His kneecap disconnected from his body, and he stumbled backwards, holding up his good arm as though trying to ward off the light.

BB blinked, holding his pillow tighter. "What's wrong with them?" he asked, a twinge of concern in his voice.

Mari furrowed her eyebrows. "I don't know," she admitted. She was freaking out inside, but she had to appear calm for BB's sake.

"It's the light," BB whispered.

Mari looked at him. That made no sense. She and BB weren't reacting to the light, and they were all made with the same programming, so why would Goldie and Foxy be affected by it and not Mari and BB?

But on the other hand, they had only started reacting when the light turned on. It was a possibility, but still, it must have been a coincidence.

"I really don't think so-"

" _No!"_ BB insisted. "It's the light! I know it is!" He turned around and glared at the camera. The flashlight immediately flickered out, but the little red light that showed that the camera was being used stayed on. Goldie gasped and stumbled backwards, breathing heavily. Foxy stopped twitching and sparking, but smoke was billowed around him in clouds. He tried to step backwards, but his broken leg crumpled underneath him and he fell onto his back.

Mari rushed forwards and knelt next to Foxy. "Foxy? Are you okay?" She waited a moment, and when he didn't respond, she stood up again. "I think he's unconscious."

"Thanks, Captain Obvious," Goldie muttered sarcastically, rubbing his eyes and looking up at the camera.

Mari squinted. She couldn't see very well in the dark, but she could have sworn that, just for a moment, his eyes were black. She zoomed her vision in on his face and saw the faint white shape of his eyes.

She shook her head. Maybe something was wrong with her software. She could ask Zoe or Fritz about it in the morning.

Suddenly, she heard what sounded like rapidly approaching footsteps coming from down the corridor next to the Show Stage. Mari whirled around to see Fritz running towards the four of them with a flashlight in his hand. He must have come to the same conclusion as BB had, because he was purposefully keeping the beam away from Goldie and Foxy. He reached them and set the flashlight on the counter, pointing it towards the wall so Goldie and Foxy weren't in the light.

"What happened?" Fritz asked, kneeling down to examine Foxy. "I saw Goldie and Foxy spazzing out, but then the light just shut off."

Mari shrugged, still annoyed that the pretty music had shut off. "Nothing, really. I just came out here because I couldn't sleep, BB followed me, Foxy and Goldie followed him, and then they just had a seizure or something. I don't know. But it's not that big of a deal, so I'll just be going back to bed now." She turned as was just about to go back to the kitchen when BB said, "I thought you came out here because you heard a noise."

If Mari had known any swears at that time, she would have said them all.

Fritz stood up. "A noise? I didn't hear anything."

Mari shook her head. "It doesn't matter. It must have been my imagination." She didn't want to tell Fritz about the music box. She wanted to keep the music all to herself.

Fritz crossed his arms. " _Mari_."

"It was nothing. Just leave it alone."

"Mari, as the security guard, I'm supposed to know of anything that might be a danger to you and the pizzeria. If you heard something, there could be someone else in here. I'm supposed to make sure this place stays safe at night. Whatever it is, I need to take care of it."

Mari hesitated, then slumped in defeat. "Fine." She walked past BB to the counter and picked up the small music box in both hands. She dejectedly held it out to Fritz. "This is what was making the noise."

She expected him to take the box, maybe throw it away or break it or something. Instead, his eyes widened and he took a step backwards. "Wh-what is that?" he stuttered.

Mari shrugged. "It's a music box, I think. I didn't even know we had one."

Fritz gulped. "Ah, we don't."

BB cocked his head in confusion. "Then how did this get here?"

Fritz reluctantly held out his hand. "Could I see that for a second?"

Mari tightened her grip on it. "Promise me you won't throw it away or wreck it?"

Fritz hesitated, then nodded. "Okay. I promise."

Mari reached out and placed the music box in his outstretched palm. He turned it over in his hands, examining the peeling paint and cracks in the wood. Hand shaking, he took a deep breath and grabbed the metal crank and turned it once. When he let it go, the enchanting music started up again. Mari was immediately struck with the same sensation she had been before, like she was in some kind of a trance. A look of fear appeared on Fritz's face as he listened to the music. Mari didn't know why. How could someone be scared of a pretty song like that?

Goldie tilted his head and took the box from Fritz. "I think I've heard this song before. I can't remember where it's from, though."

The music stopped, and Mari was snapped out of her trance. She looked up at the terrified expression on Fritz's face, and almost panicked herself. "Please don't get rid of it," she pleaded.

Fritz nodded. "I know. I won't. Just- could I maybe show this to the other guards?"

Mari hesitated. Fritz obviously thoight this music box was dangerous. If he showed it to the other guards, what would they think? Would they think the same and want to get rid of it?

But she also knew that he wouldn't be satisfied until he got a second opinion from the other guards. If she said no, he might keep it anyway.

She nodded. "Okay. Could you please give it back after, though?"

"Sure," Fritz said, taking the box back from Goldie. To her surprise, he held it out to her. "You can actually keep it for tonight. The other guards don't get here until morning, anyways."

Mari blinked and looked up at his face to see if he was serious. His expression still had a twinge of fear in it, but other than that, his face was blank.

She happily scooped the box up and cradled it in her hands. "Thank you," she said gratefully.

Fritz knelt down and picked up Foxy in both arms, struggling under the weight of the metal. "I'll take Foxy to the Parts and Service room so I can try to fix his software. Zoe can probably re-attach his hook and knee in the morning," he said, standing up. "Hey, could one of you pick up his screws and stuff and bring them to Parts and Service? My hands are kinda full here."

"Sure." BB gathered up all of Foxy's spare parts and walked after Fritz down the hall, his pillow still tucked under his arm.

Fritz stopped walking and turned around. "Hey, Goldie, you might want to come, too. Maybe I can fix whatever's in your software that's effecting you like that."

Goldie shrugged and walked towards them. "Sure, I guess."

"You go back to the kitchen and get some sleep, okay Mari?" Fritz gave her a smile.

Mari grinned back. "Okay. I'll see you in the morning." She skipped off to the kitchen, opened the doors, and slid inside, her music box tucked under one arm. She tiptoed past the sleeping forms of her friends and sat down on her pillow. She was debating whether or not she should play the music. She didn't want to wake anyone up, but still...

She held the music box in one hand and took the metal crank in the other. Slowly turning the crank, she managed to wriggle into her sleeping bag. Once the box was as wound up as it could be, she set it down next to her and rested her head on her pillow.

She had no nightmares that night.


	22. Chapter 22

**my mom keeps saying shes not transphobic bUT SHE KEEPS SAYING THAT PEOPLE ARE BORN MALE OR FEMALE AND THEY STAY THAT WAY UNLESS THEY GET SURGERY**

 **I QUOTE**

 **"-It's fine if you want to be a different gender, you might just have to wait a while because we can't afford any surgery right now."**

 **YOU JUST SAID YOU** **WEREN'T** **TRANSPHOBIC WTF ARE YOU DOING**

 **also i cant do shout outs for people who follow/favourite me and the story cuz my computer's broken and i don't have a phone im writing this on my mom's ipad i cant access my email so ye**

 **SHOUT OUTS: AliceCullen3 (thank you!) and frozem1 (thanks!).**

 **Chapter 22**

Goldie sighed as he straightened his purple top hat. He leaned against the sink in the boys' bathroom and brushed his blonde fringe away from his eyes, reliving the night before in his mind.

The nightmare he'd had that night hadn't been the same as the others. This one hadn't been about the golden plushie in the house, or even about the small, evil looking robot on the chair. This one had been nightmarish in a different kind of way. He pushed it out of his mind and tried to focus on Mari and that weird music box.

He remembered Mari waking him up in the middle of the night. He had pretended to be asleep when she left, and later she claimed that she had heard a noise that turned out to be the music box. He hadn't heard anything, however, so he had no idea how she would have been able to hear it from where they were.

Then there was the little spazz attack Foxy had when Fritz turned the light on. He hadn't actually seen it himself, as his own software had been glitching as well, but Fritz had explained while they were taking Foxy to Parts and Service. Goldie wondered why Foxy had been effected by the light worse then he was. Fritz had tried fixing their software the night before, but he had been unsuccessful.

"Sorry, Goldie," Fritz had apologized as he unplugged the wires leading from the control panel to the robot's hands. "I just can't figure out what's wrong with it. Maybe you should just avoid coming out of the kitchen at night from now on, okay?"

Goldie took a deep breath and put his yellow waistcoat on over top of his slightly lighter dress shirt. He should just forget about it. It was just making him worried.

He tightened his bow tie and straightened his yellow bear ears before turning away from the mirror and walking out of the bathroom. He tried to push all the negative thoughts from his mind as he walked straight down the hallway towards the security room. Mari had given Fritz the music box first thing that morning, and Fritz had put it in the security room so when he and Scott came back after working hours, they could talk to the other guards about it. Goldie wanted to take a look at the music box again, just to see if he could figure anything out.

He was just about to past Party Room 3 when he heard a sound from behind him. He turned around. It seemed to be coming from the room he just passed. He walked towards it and glanced inside, then realized that it was coming from the wall on the right of the room. He cautiously walked towards it. He examined the wall for the source of the sound. It was a continuous noise, never stopping. It was hard to tell, but sounded almost like music. It didn't sound like the music box, however. This was different.

Goldie stepped back from the wall. There was nothing there that could be making the music. He walked out of the room and looked to his right. The closest room to this one was the Parts and Service room. He walked towards the door and opened it. Zoe was inside, fiddling around with the mechanical stuff in Foxy's head. Foxy's hook and knee were now re-attached to the rest of his body, and he was propped up on a chair with his eye closed as Zoe inspected Foxy's open head. After a quick glance around the room, Goldie concluded that there was nothing that could be making this music and closed the door.

He walked back and stood between the party room and Parts and Service. If it wasn't coming from either room, it had to be coming from the wall between them. He examined it closely and saw a faint outline of a rectangle about the size of a door in the wallpaper. He pushed on it with one hand and it opened slightly. The sound was much clearer now, and Goldie realized that the sound was, in fact, music. He recognized it as a violin. Goldie opened the door a little wider and poked his head in so he could see.

Inside was a small room that had a bed and a dresser pushed aside to one wall. Random objects were scattered all over the floor, and the drawers of the dresser were open, spilling clothes onto the carpet. Vincent stood in the center of the room, his eyes closed, an untroubled, serene look on his face. In one of his hands, he held a violin, the other end resting on his shoulder. In his other was a bow. He dragged it across the strings of the instrument, releasing a gentle, melodic sound that resonated throughout the room.

The scene was familiar. He thought back to the dream he'd had that night and felt an odd pressure on his chest. He gasped at the feeling, and the music suddenly broke off. Goldie quickly backed out of the doorway and ran back to the bathroom. His eyes felt odd as well, and when he looked in the mirror, he saw a clear liquid like water running down his face from his eyes.


	23. Chapter 23

**so i just rewatched marble hornets and then i watched troy moves out and joseph touches a grapefruit and bunch of others and hOLY FUCK I CAN NEVER TAKE MARBLE HORNETS SERIOUSLY AGAIN GODDAMMIT**

 **"Grapefruits are bullshit!" "YOU'RE BULLSHIT"**

 **LIKE THESE FCUKIN MEN MADE A HORROR SERIES**

 **fuk it im writing in third person w zoe from now on bc i cant do first person**

 **SHOUT OUTS:**

 **Chapter 23**

"I swear, it's working!"

Fritz reached for the music box, but Vincent, being the tall-ass giant that he was, raised his arm and held it out of his reach. Fritz stepped on a chair and tried to reach it, but Vincent stepped backwards. "Fritz, get off the chair or I'll cut your fucking pay cheque."

Fritz huffed angrily and stepped off the chair. "Could you just let me see it?"

Vincent opened his mouth to resond, but Scott, being even taller than Vincent was, reached over and plucked the music box from his hands. Vincent shot his a glare, but said nothing.

Scott turned the metal crank of the music box. He shrugged. "Yeah, I don't hear anything."

Fritz smacked his forehead. "How can you not hear that?"

Mike shook his head. "I don't hear anything, either. Maybe you need to see a doctor, Fritz."

Springtrap furrowed her eyebrows as she walked into the room. She sat down next to Freddy at one of the tables. "What are they arguing about?"

Freddy sighed. "Mari found a music box last night, and Fritz decided to show it to the other guards. He keeps saying that it works, but I'm not hearing anything."

Springtrap sighed and adjusted her purple bow tie. "Neither am I. Maybe he didn't get much sleep and now he's imagining things. He does need to stay up all night to watch the restaurant."

"Well, I hope Jeremy gets here soon," Freddy said, exasperated. "We're supposed to open in five minutes, and I want to get this work day over with."

Springtrap nodded. "I'm just hoping the kids won't be as annoying as last time."

Freddy sighed. "Yeah. They tried to use me as a jungle gym yesterday."

"They did?" She snorted. She could just imagine a bunch of little kids climbing all over him, knocking his hat off his head, and basically annoying the crap out of him.

Freddy opened his mouth to reply, but before he could, the door to the restaurant opened and Jeremy rushed in, the jacket of his purple uniform buttoned wrong and his yellow tie not tied up. As soon as he entered, he started babbling. "Oh my gosh I'm _so_ sorry I'm late I forgot to set my alarm and I didn't wake up until about like nine thirty and then it was like a twenty three minute drive here and I'm sorry!" He paused for a breath and seemed about to continue, but then he saw the music box in Scott's hands and furrowed his eyebrows. "Where did you get that?"

Scott shrugged. "Mari found it last night." He held it out to Jeremy. "It's kinda broken, though."

Fritz huffed again. "It's not broken!"

Jeremy cautiously took it in his hands and turned the crank. "What do you mean, it's broken? It doesn't _sound_ broken." He looked at Fritz. "Isn't this the music box we had when we worked here before? I thought it burned in that fire. Nobody ever told me we got a new one."

Fritz's eyes widened. Then he turned to the other guards. "See? He can hear it too! It's not broken!"

Jeremy looked taken aback. "What? Can they not hear it or something?"

Mike opened his mouth to say something, but Vincent's watch suddenly beeped. He glanced down at it. "Alright everyone, get in your places. Bonnie, go get the rest of the animatronics out of the bathrooms. And Mangle, for the last time, get off the ceiling."

 _ **xXx**_

"And so then the kid gave me a bouquet of flowers they picked earlier this morning!" Tia gushed as she and Chica walked into the kitchen after work. This day had been a lot more calm. The buzz about the reopening of the pizzeria had died down a bit, and there were a lot less crazy fans crowding the restaurant that day. The parents had more control over their younger children, and whenever one of the animatronics seemed to be almost overwhelmed with attention from the children, some of the other robots would distract them with food or a fun game.

"It was so sweet!" Tia continued. "Then they wanted me to braid their hair, but I couldn't because I was working, so they just followed me around for the rest of the time they were here and asked me about our job! It was _so_ adorable!"

Chica nodded, even though she wasn't really listening. She glanced up at the clock on the wall. It was already 10:30 pm. The day had gone by surprisingly fast, and she was tired.

Tia skipped up to the counter and took a long sniff of the flowers in she'd gotten that morning. They didn't have any vases, so she had set them in a tall glass full of water.

She smiled. "I love those kids. They're so adorable!" She skipped over to her sleeping bag (god, she did a lot of skipping) and sat down on it, her nightgown billowing around her legs.

Chica sat down on her own sleeping bag and gave her friend a polite smile. "You should probably be a bit quieter, Tia. Some people are already sleeping," she whispered, pointing to Goldie's, Tonnie's, and Teddy's unconscious forms in their sleeping bags.

Tia giggled. "Oh, sorry!" she whispered back.

Chica smiled. "Well, I'm kind of tired. Goodnight, Tia!"

"Goodnight, Chica!" Tia grinned back. They simultaneously flopped down in their sleeping bags and closed their eyes.

 ** _xXx_**

 _"Hey, Chica!"_

 _Chica sighed. She was back in the same dark room she had been the last few nights. There was no detail to the room; it was just blank, with paint so dark it looked like she was standing in a void. She didn't respond to the voice. She promised herself she'd stay quiet this time._

 _"Aww, come on, Chica! Is that really how you greet an old friend?"_

 _Suddenly, a pinkish-purple light filled the room. Chica had to avert her eyes to avoid going blind. When she looked back, the light had dimmed, leaving a glowing magenta humanoid shape in its place. Light still shined off the petite form, but now it wasn't so blinding._

 _Chica took a deep breath. She was trying not to get angry, but she was starting to get sick of this._

 _The shape tilted its head. "What's wrong, Chica? Are you scared of us?"_

 _At her words, a whole bunch of glowing human-looking silhouettes appeared, each with a different coloured light. She shut her eyes tightly until she was sure that the light had faded. She looked around her, looking at all the different coloured shapes in the room. A light amber, dark red, a light shade of violet, orange, turquoise, light pink, grey, dark blue, green-yellow, the magenta one, and the yellow-orange coming off of her own body._

 _Looks like they're all here, she thought. She didn't know what any of their names were, so when she thought of them, she usually referred to them as the colours of light they had._

 _She sighed. Try as she might, she just couldn't stay silent. "I'm not scared of you, dipshit. I'm sick and tired of you yelling in my head 24/7."_

 _Turquoise giggled. "Ha! She speaks!"_

 _Chica growled. "Yes, I do. So why don't you ever seem to hear me when I tell you to LEAVE ME ALONE?!"_

 _Amber snorted. "Selective hearing?" it suggested. A few of the others laughed._

 _Chica was getting really pissed off now. "Look, I'm going to ask you one more time: why me? Why not one of the others?"_

 _She didn't expect an answer. She never got one before. And, just like she predicted, the majority of them just laughed._

 _"Because of your experience."_

 _They all stopped and turned towards the voice that had spoken. It was the petite grey form that had never spoken before. The dark blue one stood beside it, holding Grey's hand, like usual._

 _The silhouettes all stared at it. Chica was equally surprised. Grey and Blue had never interfered before._

 _Grey and Blue started walking towards Chica. The other light forms all stood aside and let them pass. Once the two reached her, Grey put a hand on her shoulder. "You've suffered more than the rest of us have. Maybe he was taken apart-" it pointed to Pink- "maybe he was forgotten-" it pointed to Red- "and maybe I was forced into an endless sleep. But you were killed, tortured, you fell apart, you watched as someone took your place and your attention, and you weren't taken seriously because of your appearance." Grey shook its head. "We may have suffered, but you have too. We're all stuck like this. We haven't settled into our bodies the way you have. You're only one who can feel pain. You can actually taste that food you love making so much. We don't know what we're doing half the time, and we don't remember our dreams as vividly as you do. We're not trying to hurt you, Chica. We're trying to protect you."_

 _Grey took its hand off her shoulder and stepped back. "Good luck."_

 _And with those words, the light disappeared, and everything faded._

 ** _i'M So SoRRy fOR tHe sHTiTy cHAPteR bYE i'm LEavINg tO go CAmPinG NoW_**


	24. Chapter 24

**kay but like zoe was gonna be the main character here but now all of a sudden it's goldie idk why**

 **shit i forgot the shout outs last time im soRRY**

 **SHOUT OUTS: Guest (i dont fuckin caaare) and maibigbutt (A: idk. probably just die from stress overload.)**

 **Chapter 24**

Goldie was laying down in his sleeping bag when he heard Chica and Tia walk in. Tia was chattering excitedly while Chica stayed politely silent, listening as her friend rambled on. As soon as they walked in, Goldie closed his eyes and pretended to be asleep. He had skipped the work day and just hid out in the bathroom for the entire eight hours, and he didn't want anyone asking him where he'd been. Luckily, the two girls didn't seem to notice him.

The day had been quite boring, hiding in the bathroom for eight hours, but he had been too nervous to go out there and interact with the others, especially with Vincent. Their boss had a reputation for losing his temper for the littlest of reasons, and though no one had actually ever yelled at Goldie yet, he was pretty sure that he wouldn't enjoy the experience.

After a short (and quite one-sided) conversation, Tia and Chica both slid into their sleeping bags and went to sleep.

Goldie lay in his own sleeping bag, trying to sleep, but last night's dream kept him awake. What if he dreamed about it again? It hadn't really been scary, so he wasn't sure whether it qualified as a nightmare or not, but whatever the case, it hadn't been particularly enjoyable.

 _Maybe if I go to sleep, I'll dream about something else,_ he thought. _Then I'll be thinking about that dream instead._

He sighed and closed his eyes to go to sleep when he heard the doors open, and Freddy's voice echoed off the walls. "How did that even happen?"

"I don't know," Springtrap's frustrated voice replied. "I was just standing there, and suddenly there's a gash in my arm, and there's oil everywhere."

"How many times has this happened?"

"I don't know. I stopped keeping track around twelve." There was an annoyed sigh, followed by a _whump_ as Springtrap flopped down on her sleeping bag.

There was a rustle of fabric as Freddy sat down on his own. "Did you talk to Zoe?"

"Yeah. She repaired it, more or less." She paused. "Hey, did you ever ask Teddy about that orange spot on his shoulder?"

"Yeah. I told him he should see Zoe about it, but he thinks it looks cool. I thought it was rust, maybe, but it feels more like paint."

"How would you know what rust feels like, anyway? How would you know the difference?"

Freddy didn't reply.

Springtrap sighed. "Well, goodnight then." There was a rustling sound as she crawled into her sleeping bag. There was a short pause, and then Freddy squirmed into his as well.

Goldie thought about their conversation until he finally fell asleep.

 _ **xXx**_

 _Goldie wasn't in the house with the yellow bear again. He was concerned, as all the other dreams he'd had while he wasn't in the house had been terrible, like the last one, and the couple others before._

 _Instead of being inside the house, he was curled up under a table. Tears ran down his face, and he was snivelling like a little kid. He wiped his eyes and glanced around. Chairs and other tables were scattered everywhere, and he could see children in between the chairs and tables, knocking things over and yelling. He appeared to be in some kind of restaurant._

 _Goldie was just about to close his eyes and wait for when this dream would turn into a nightmare, when he suddenly heard a familiar voice._

"He left without you."

 _Goldie gasped and looked around for the yellow bear hopefully, but it was nowhere in sight. He was probably just imagining things. His hope deflated, but then he heard it again._

"He knows that you hate it here."

 _He looked up. Still no bear. Nevertheless, he hopeful once again. He obviously wasn't alone._

"You are right beside the exit," _the bear's disembodied voice said._ "If you run, you can make it."

 _Goldie hesitated. He didn't get up._

"Hurry, run towards the exit," _the voice urged._

 _Goldie took a deep, shaky breath. He wiped the tears from his face and crawled out from under the table. He got to his feet and looked around._

 _He had been right. He was in a restaurant. There were waiters walking around, handing out platters of pizza to people. A bunch of kids were running around, pizza sauce smeared across their faces and all over their fingers. And just behind the table he had been laying under was a big picture of a bright yellow bear with a purple top hat and bow tie._

So that's where the voice is coming from, _Goldie thought. He_ _began walking towards the right side of the room, but the voice interrupted._

"No! Don't you remember what you saw? The exit is the other way! Hurry and leave."

 _The voice sounded very urgent, so Goldie figured that he'd better follow its advice. He turned to run the other way, but an oddly familiar, yellow, bear-looking robot blocked his path. For some reason, the sight of it made him terrified._

"It's too late. Hurry, run the other way and find someone who can help! You know what will happen if he catches you!"

 _Goldie wanted to point out that, no, he actually did not know, and would not like to either, but he decided not to argue. He turned around and ran past the bear picture and towards a couple of tables. He looked to his right and saw two silhouettes that looked similar to the bear robot_ _. He was hesitant to go anywhere near them._

"You can find help if you can get past them," _the bear's voice encouraged him._ "You have to be strong."

 _He was still feeling a little scared, even with the bear encouraging him. What would happen if he went near those things? He glanced back at the yellow robot, but instead ended up seeing something else._

 _The robot was still there, but there was a pair of doors next to the bear picture that he hadn't noticed before. They were wide open, and in the room beyond was a person dressed all in purple. His hat, his shirt, his pants- all the same shade of bright violet. The person was facing another in an odd looking yellow-green suit. The purple person slid a mask that resembled a rabbit over the other person's head. Goldie didn't know why, but this made him even more scared. The only reason he didn't scream was because he knew that while the little yellow bear wasn't there physically, it was still-_ there, _kind of, which meant that he wasn't completely alone._

 _The person in purple straightened out the other one's mask and nodded in satisfaction. Then the red doors of the room seemed to swing shut of their own accord._

 _Goldie was still absolutely terrified, so he turned and ran away. He heard the heavy clanking of metal footsteps and started crying once again. He collapsed in fear, and curled up under another table as the giant yellow robot stood over him._

"Tomorrow is another day."

 _Upon hearing these words and the reassuring voice of his yellow bear friend, Goldie almost-_ almost- _felt alright._


	25. Chapter 25

**Shout outs: maibigbutt (thnx)**

 **ayy it's spooky time motherfuckers**

 **i'm being ciel phantomhive for halloween and i fucking love my costume**

 **sry i havent updated in like a month my mom's making me play volleyball and i haven't had much time to write (actually i've just been procrastinating but whatever)**

 **and i think i'll stop doing the shout outs like you guys know that i see your reviews and if i wanna reply then ill just pm u but idk i might i might no s**

 **Chapter 25**

Chica sighed as she opened her eyes the next morning. She wished those stupid dreams would stop. They weren't nightmares, exactly, but they were definitely annoying.

She glanced next to her at Tia, who was sleeping peacefully with the ghost of a smile on her face. Chica wished she could stay positive like her sister, but it was kind of hard to when voices were screaming in her head 24/7.

 _Good morning, Chica._

Right on time.

Chica scowled. Well, not really. The animatronics' faces had been built to express limited facial expressions, mostly ones of happiness, so it looked more like a grin than anything else. That made her even more annoyed.

"Great," she whispered, careful not to wake anyone. "You're back. Care to explain what happened last night with Blue and Grey?"

The answer to this question was no different than every other response she was met with. The giggle of the magenta ghost reverberated through her metal skull, but there was a waver of uncertainty in its voice.

"Well?" Chica asked quietly. "I'm waiting."

"Who are you talking to?"

Chica sat up and whirled around. Mari was sitting up in her sleeping bag. The music box next to her pillow had slowed to a stop, the music fading with it. The puppet animatronic rubbed her eyes sleepily.

Chica plastered on a grin, which wasn't hard considering that her face already looked like it was smiling from her attempt at scowling. "Oh, no one. My brain's still in Sleep Mode. I probably thought I was still dreaming or something."

 _Wow,_ said the sarcastic voice of the orange ghost. _Great cover._

Chica tried to ignore the voices of the ghosts that were gradually arriving one by one as Mari nodded. She still looked dead tired, and Chica was pretty sure that the puppet hadn't even heard her excuse.

"So, how's that working for you?" Chica asked, nodding to the music box.

Mari looked down at the small box and smiled fondly. "It's great. I haven't had a single nightmare for the past two nights."

"That's good," Chica said, only half listening. It was kind of hard to pay attention to other people when there were voices raging inside her head.

"Well, I'm gonna go get dressed," Mari said, gathering up her tuxedo from beside her sleeping bag. "I think we have a birthday booked for ten a.m., so we've only got about an hour to get ready. We should probably wake up the others so they can get dressed, too."

Chica nodded. She picked up her dress and shoes that she'd set beside her sleeping bag and tried her best to tune out the voices. "Probably." She looked over at Bonnie and Teddy, who were both asleep on the counters. Teddy's headband was hanging from one ear and Bonnie had fallen asleep with his face in a pizza box. "It takes those two at least twenty minutes to drag themselves out of bed, and it takes them another forty minutes to do their hair."

Mari shrugged. "Yeah. I don't know why though. I mean, who are they trying to impress here? A bunch of five to ten year old kids?"

Chica snorted. "Well, I sure hope not," she said as she gently shook Tia's shoulder.

Tia's eyes fluttered open and she yawned sleepily. "Good morning," she said, a smile already stretching across her face.

"We have a birthday party at ten," Chica said, standing up. "We need to get ready."

Suddenly, the kitchen doors swung open and slammed against the walls. A loud _bang_ resonated through the room, jarring everyone awake. Teddy yelped and fell off the counter, while Bonnie sat bolt upright and accidentally banged his head on the cupboard above his head.

Zoe and her weird friend Raina ran into the room. Zoe looked oddly excited, and Raina was smiling. Zoe had a bunch of empty backpacks in her hands.

"That hurt..." Bonnie whined, rubbing the back of his head.

"No it didn't!" Zoe yelled excitedly. "Is everyone awake?" She looked around the room.

"Well, it's kind of hard to stay asleep when you're yelling," Tonnie said, rubbing his eyes.

BB sat up in his sleeping bag. "What's going on?" he asked.

"Raina found a place for you to stay, that's what's going on!" Zoe yelled.

"Well, actually, Scott showed it to me when were walking to Subway for lunch a week ago," Raina corrected. "It was pretty cheap, but we didn't really have enough money for it, so Zoe and I pooled together some of our saved money, but we _still_ didn't have enough and we couldn't spare any more, so Jeremy, Fritz, and Mike pitched in, and even though they didn't have much to spare, Scott and Vincent added some, too, and so we bought it, and now you guys have a place to stay!" She'd gotten progressively more excited as she spoke, and now she was practically squealing.

"Come on!" Zoe shouted. "Pack up your shit and let's go!" She tossed the bags into the air, and they fell to the floor in a scattered heap.

"What about Foxy?" Mangle asked, picking up a backpack. "Is he repaired yet?"

"What's wrong with him anyway?" Freddy asked as he stuffed his work uniform and his casual clothes into a bag.

Zoe's smile wavered. "He's not doing so well. I've tried everything I could think of. I think something's wrong with his programming or something, because it's definitely not his sensors. I've checked his mechanics, but nothing's wrong with those. Fritz is checking his software right now, but I don't know if he'll be able to find anything." She shrugged. "I'm sure he'll be fine, though. Anyway, let's get you guys out of here!"

 **sry for the short filler chapter i'll try to update again this month and i want to have this entire story done by december 2017 but knowing me i'll probably just end up procrastinating and it won't be done until like 3189 or some shit so ye**


	26. Chapter 26

**( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)exotic butters( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)**

 **Chapter 26**

Goldie stepped outside and blinked as the bright sunlight hit his eyes. He and the other animatronics had never been outside the restaurant before, mostly because they were so busy with work, and they had really only seen the sun through the windows before. It was really bright, and he wasn't sure if he liked it or not.

Mangle burst out of the restaurant, Tonnie following close behind. "I call shotgun!" Mangle yelled, accidentally bumping into Goldie in his race to Zoe's pickup truck.

"Aw, come on!" Tonnie whined, running after his friend. "I wanted the front seat!" He crashed into Bonnie, who snarled and shoved him away.

"Don't fight!" Zoe called, stepping out the doors. "Tonnie, you can have the front seat on the way back this afternoon!"

At that, Tonnie cheered up immensely. He happily crawled into the backseat of Zoe's truck.

"Okay, I can take four people in my truck," Zoe announced. "Raina can take five in her car because it has an extra seat in the front. Two of you can probably go in the cargo bed of my truck, but you're going to have to be careful, because I don't want to have to reattach any disconnected limbs if you fall out the back."

Teddy and Bonnie exchanged a glance, then both scrambled to get into the back of the truck.

Zoe sighed. "Okay, I would prefer that you two go _in_ a vehicle, but whatever. I'll take Chica and the Toys. Raina, if you're okay with taking Goldie, Mari, BB, Freddy, and Spring-"

"No prob, Bob!" Raina gave her friend a smile, then bounded over to her car.

Goldie sighed and climbed into the back of Raina's car. This was going to be a long ride.

 _ **xXx**_

The ride was actually only seven minutes, but it felt much longer. Raina had turned the radio to some pop station and was singing loudly along to the songs. Mari was playing around with her music box, BB was jumping up and down excitedly in his seat, trying to talk to anybody about what their house would be like ("Do you think it'll be big? Does it already have furniture? Where will we sleep?), Springtrap was complaining loudly about the brightness of "that giant yellow orb in the sky", and Freddy was trying to clean up a bunch of oil that was, for some reason, leaking from Springtrap's hand.

Goldie hated pop music.

When the vehicles finally stopped, BB was the first one out. He gazed at the one-story house in awe. They were at the very edge of town, on a street where a bunch of the buildings looked very rough and run-down. The houses might have once been bright and colourful, but now they looked grey and empty. Goldie thought it looked sad (and oddly familiar), but BB looked estatic.

Zoe shut the door to her truck. "Well, it's not much, but it was the only thing available that was really cheap."

"Scott said that it used to belong to a friend of his," Raina said, slamming her own door shut. "The previous owner passed away, and no one's really lived in it since."

Bonnie smirked. "Do you think it's haunted?" he asked, looking over at Teddy.

Teddy shrugged. "I don't know. What do you say we find out?" They both laughed and ran up the steps and through the door.

Zoe started towards the house. "Come on guys. We've got everything set up already."

Goldie glanced up at the house. He'd never been out of the restaurant before today, but he couldn't shake the feeling that he'd been here already.

He took a deep breath and walked towards the house.

 ** _xXx_**

The door opened into a slightly cramped living room, complete with an old TV, a faded blue couch, and an orange rug that was flecked with dirt. There was a closed door next to the TV, and on the other end of the room, there was on open doorway that led to a room with an old grandfather clock sitting against one wall. On the other end of the grandfather clock room was another closed door. Goldie peeked into the room with the clock and saw a long hallway leading to another closed door, and another one set against the left side of the hallway.

"We cleaned up some of the furniture," Raina said. "There are two bedrooms down there-" she pointed down the hallway, "-and another one through there." She pointed to the closed door across from the living room. "You guys can leave your bags here for now and look around, and after work, you can decide on who gets to sleep where."

"We're going to go back to the pizzeria and try to get Foxy working again," Zoe said, walking out the door. "Don't destroy the place while we're gone. We'll be back after lunch to get you for work."

"Wait," Mari started, "don't we have a birthday party at-"

Zoe shut the door, and they were gone.

"Ten," Mari finished.

Bonnie and Teddy immediately threw down their bags and ran down the hallway, disappearing through the left door.

"Whoa, they've already got beds!" Bonnie's yelled happily.

"Hey, I think I found another hallway!" Teddy's voice rang out from the room.

Tia grabbed Chica's wrist. "Come on, let's go find the kitchen!" The two sisters opened the door in the living room and ran through eagerly.

Freddy glanced down at Springtrap's oily arm and sighed. "As much as I would like to explore, I think we should find a bathroom and get you cleaned up." The two of them disappeared through the living room door.

BB knelt down in front of the TV. "I wonder if this still works." He began pressing buttons, trying to turn it on.

Mari wandered into the grandfather clock room. She gazed at the clock in awe. "This is beautiful," she whispered. "I wonder how it works."

Mangle looked around. "This would be a great place to play hide-and-seek."

Tonnie grinned. "I'll count first!" He covered his eyes and began counting. "One, two, three..."

Mangle smiled and dashed down the hallway across from the clock.

Goldie wasn't sure what else to do, so he decided to go down the living room hallway and see what was down there. He didn't want to wait around for Mari to destroy the grandfather clock (which she would most likely end up doing in an attempt to take it apart to find out how it works) or for BB to figure out that the TV wasn't even plugged into the outlet in the wall.

He walked through the doorway, and the feeling of familiarity increased. There were four doors in the hall, two on the left, and two on the right. A small window was set into the wall near the ceiling. An odd place for a window, it seemed. The lights were on in the two left rooms- the bathroom and the kitchen, he assumed.

He started walking towards the end of the hall. He glanced in the two right doors as he passed. One had a large table in the centre of it, surrounded by a bunch of dusty wooden chairs. Probably a dining room. The other room's door was closed. He opened it and saw that it was filled with boxes and old furniture. A storage room. He'd have to check that out later.

Goldie reached the end of the hallway. He felt like there was something missing here.

"What are you doing?"

Goldie whipped around and saw BB standing in the doorway at the beginning of the hall. He looked kind of confused, and Goldie wasn't sure why. Then he realized that he probably made an odd image, staring down at a blank spot on the floor at the end of the hall.

He shrugged. "Nothing. What about you? Did you get the TV to work?"

BB nodded and started walking forward. "Yeah, but I don't know how to change the channel." He reached Goldie and followed his gaze to the floor. "Whatcha looking at?"

Another shrug. "Dunno. The floor, I guess."

"Why?" BB asked.

Goldie looked up at him. Something about the look on his face made something shift in Goldie. Before he knew what he was doing, he found himself speaking. "BB, could you stand there for a moment?" he asked, pointing at the area right under the small window.

BB furrowed his eyebrows, but he didn't ask any questions. He shifted his position so his back was to the window and shuffled backwards until he was up against the wall. Goldie ran back towards the living room door. He didn't quite know what he was doing, but he knew it was important. He reached the door and slapped the light switch on the wall. Immediately, the light in the hallway turned off, leaving only the light from the window. It cast eerie shadows across BB's face, making him look like something from...

A nightmare.

Goldie burst into the bathroom to see Freddy wrapping up a gash on Springtrap's arm. "Freddy, get Chica and meet me in the other hallway." He ran back out into the living room without waiting for a response.

He dashed through the living room, BB running after him and worriedly asking him what he was doing. Goldie ignored him. He needed Foxy, but since he wasn't there at the moment, he had to find Mangle.

He ran past Mari, who had successfully taken apart the grandfather clock and had scattered its remains across the dark blue floor. She looked up as he ran past. She must have seen the concerned look in BB's eyes when he ran after him, because then she joined in the chase as well.

Goldie ran to the end of the hall and opened the door. Inside was a familiar room, complete with checkered carpeting, a bed with a blue comforter, and a bright blue dresser. He didn't even try to deny it this time. He had definitely been here before.

Inside the room, Tonnie was looking for Mangle. There weren't many places to hide, and Goldie could very clearly see Mangle under the bed, but they probably just wanted the game to last longer. Goldie didn't care about their game though. So while Tonnie was looking in the empty closet, Goldie knelt down to speak to Mangle. "Meet everyone in the master bedroom." He turned around, pushed Mari and BB aside, and sprinted into the other bedroom in the hallway.

Bonnie was rummaging through the drawers in the dresser, and Teddy was looking up at a bunch of photos on the wall in the hallway on the right side of the room. Against the middle of the back wall was a bed big enough for two, and there was a blue dresser on each side of the room. Children's toys were scattered on the floor. Zoe and Raina must not have gotten around to cleaning this room yet.

Goldie walked towards Teddy and yanked him into the room (accompanied with a startled yelp from said animatronic) just as Freddy entered the room, followed by Chica, Tia, and Springtrap. Goldie did a quick head count. Everyone was there.

Goldie didn't hesitate. He ushered everyone into the centre of the room and set to work positioning them around the room. He grabbed Chica's shoulders and pushed her over to the right hallway. He placed her right outside the doorway, then pushed Bonnie over to the left door. He grabbed Freddy and sat him down on the bed, then took Mangle's wrists and pulled him into the closet. Goldie didn't quite know what to do with the other Toys, so he directed Tia over to Chica, Tonnie over to Bonnie, and Teddy over to Freddy. Mari, BB, and Springtrap didn't have places in the room, so he just motioned for them to sit down on the floor in front of the bed.

All of a sudden, everything clicked into place.

 **ayyy guess who updated twice in one month**

 **(⌐■ ͜ʖ■) dis guy**

 **have a spoopy halloween frens**

 **k bye**


	27. Chapter 27

**i'm trying to decide what my name's gonna be and rn it's between sebastian, daniel, and jonah so until i figure it out my username's just gonna be my initials from my birth name**

 **also i went back and edited some previous chapters (every single one up to 20) and i added some extra little things in some chapters (like some foreshadowing) and i changed zoe's first person chapters to third person so if you wanna re-read those then please do**

 **like please re-read them they're so much better now**

 **Chapter 27**

Chica had been the first one to reach Goldie when he collapsed on the floor. The voices in her head were raging.

 _What the FUCK?_ Orange's voice screamed.

 _Is he remembering?_ Amber asked, panic in their voice.

 _Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god-._ Violet sounded absolutely terrified.

 _Okay, I wasn't there when all this first happened, so somebody had better explain,_ Yellow Green demanded.

"My thoughts exactly," Chica muttered, kneeling over Goldie and pushing him onto his _back._ "What's wrong with him?"

All the other voices went silent when Grey replied. _He's finally remembered, like you have._

 _What?_ Chica thought. _I haven't remembered anything._

 _You remembered what being alive was like. You remember pain. You remember what food tastes like. None of_ us _remember. We can finally talk to him, too._

"Talk to him?" Chica whispered. "Like, the way you talk to me?"

 _Yes. We can pull him out of his nightmares and protect him. We can prevent is supposed to happen._

"What's supposed to-" She sighed. "Never mind." She looked up and saw that everyone else who had surrounded Goldie were staring at her. She figured that she probably looked pretty weird, talking to herself.

Chica stood up. "I'll go get Zoe."

"But we don't have a car!" Mangle protested.

"I don't care," she said, walking towards the door." How else are we supposed to get help?"

Nobody responded.

Chica stood up and began to run.

 ** _xXx_**

Zoe closed up Foxy's chest plates. She was fairly sure that she had repaired all of the damage from that night when Mari had found the music box. As long as Fritz had fixed his software, hopefully he could be reactivated.

Zoe looked up at Fritz. "Okay. Go ahead."

Fritz nodded. "Here goes nothing." He pressed a few keys on his laptop, and the wires leading from the control panel to Foxy's hands sparked. Foxy jolted and sat bolt upright.

He glanced around in a panic. "What did I miss?" He looked down at his naked body. "Where the fuck are my clothes?"

Zoe picked up his clothes off the floor. "Relax. There's not even anything you need to cover up." She tossed the pile of fabric onto his lap.

Foxy pulled on his t-shirt. "How long have I been out?"

Fritz shrugged. "About two days."

"Bloody bones," Foxy whispered as he struggled to pull on his pants. "That long?"

Zoe nodded. "We found a house for you guys to stay in. Everyone else is already there, but we should probably keep you here for another hour just to keep an eye on you and make sure you're working properly."

Just then, the door burst open and Chica dashed in. She glanced at Foxy, then turned to Zoe. "Something's wrong with Goldie."

That was all Chica said, but it was enough to send Zoe into a panic. "Get to the truck!" she yelled, grabbing her coat and pulling it on. Fritz unplugged his laptop and shoved it into his bag. Zoe snatched her toolbox from the floor. She grabbed Foxy's hook and pulled him out the door after Chica and Fritz. They sprinted out of the restaurant and piled into Zoe's truck. Zoe and Fritz tossed their toolbox and laptop into the back seat with Chica and Foxy. Zoe tore out of the parking lot and sped down the street.

"Nice to see you, Foxy," Chica said, buckling her seat belt.

"Nice to see you, too," Foxy replied. "Now will someone explain?"

Chica took a deep breath and told them about how Goldie had positioned each of them in different areas in the master bedroom and then collapsed.

Zoe had no words. First it had been Foxy, then Goldie. Which one of her kids would go haywire next?

 _My kids_. Zoe was surprised at herself. That was something she hadn't thought about for weeks. She'd been too distracted by the pizzeria and her new job to think much about that. A memory fought its way into her mind, and she pushed it back. She didn't have time for that now. She had to focus on the task at hand. She pulled herself out of her thoughts and focused on the road.

"Did he fall apart like I did?" Foxy asked.

Chica shook her head. "No. He just crumpled."

"Then it probably wasn't anything with the lighting," Foxy mumbled.

Everyone was silent for a moment. Then Fritz spoke. "Goldie tried to kill me a few nights ago."

Zoe tore her eyes off the road and whirled to face him. "He _what_?"

"I didn't want to tell anyone because I thought that maybe the pizzeria would be shut down for good." Fritz leaned back in his seat. "He just started walking towards the office. I wouldn't have thought twice about it, but he looked- _weird_ on the cameras."

"Like, how weird?" Chica asked curiously.

"You can explain later," Zoe interrupted as she pulled into the driveway of the house. "If we need any help, we should call Vincent. He said he used to be a mechanic, so maybe he could help out if we need it."

The four of them got out of the vehicle and dashed up the steps. When they got inside, Chica took the lead and ran past the grandfather clock (which was lying on the floor in pieces for some reason) and down the hallway. They ran through a door in the left side of the corridor and entered the master bedroom.

Goldie was lying on the bed, covered in blankets. He was shivering, and Springtrap and Freddy sat one the edge of the bed, seeming unsure of what to do. Tia, Tonnie, and Mangle were all huddled in one corner, whispering. All three of them looked concerned, and they kept glancing at Goldie as though they were waiting for something to happen. BB was standing in the doorway to the other hall, looking as though he was about to cry. Mari stood next to him, her arm around his shoulder. She was talking quietly, probably trying to reassure him, but she looked just as upset, if not more. Teddy and Bonnie were both sitting on the floor. They were talking and laughing and acting like everything was fine, but their laughs were forced and half-hearted, and they kept sneaking concerned glances at the bed.

Everyone looked up when Fritz, Zoe, Foxy, and Chica walked into the room. All of them but Goldie started talking all at once.

"-was acting really weird when we got here-"

"-under the window at the end of the living room hall-"

"-started running-"

"-were in the kitchen making pizza-"

"-arm started leaking oil-"

"-nice to see Foxy's back-"

"-playing hide and seek-"

"Everyone shut up!" Fritz yelled.

Everyone did.

Zoe walked over to the bed. "We'll take him back to the pizzeria and try to get him fixed up. Hopefully, he'll be fine by Halloween." She pulled the blankets off Goldie and picked him up. "Chica, you can give Foxy a tour of the place and help him get settled in. I'll bring his work clothes and his pyjamas over later. I'll get Raina to take the rest of you shopping for costumes tomorrow." She turned and walked out without another word.

 **another shitty ending to another shitty chapter**

 **damn tho i'm doing really well with the updates this month**

 **i'll try to get a halloween chapter up either later this week or sometime in the first half of november**

 **either way there will be a halloween chapter i don't care if i get it out in fuckin january there _will_ be one**


	28. Chapter 28

**fourth chapter in one month god damn i'm on fire**

 **Chapter 28**

Zoe sighed and shut Goldie's faceplates. She'd been trying to find out what was wrong with him for day now, and she couldn't find anything. She hoped he would be okay.

She glanced down at her watch. It was 12:45 pm. Raina would be back with the other animatronics from costume shopping any minute now.

Zoe placed her tools back into her toolbox. She just couldn't figure it out. Maybe she'd get Fritz to take a look at his software later.

Suddenly, a voice rang through the restaurant. "I'm BAAAAAAAAAAACK~!"

Zoe smiled and walked out into the dining room. "Hey, Raina. What costumes did you get?"

Raina set a box on a table and sat down at a table. "Well, we went to various stores, but none of them could really find anything that they liked. So, I visited some fabric stores and decided to _make_ them costumes instead. I haven't quite finished yet, but they're going to need fangs and some paint for their final costumes. I'm thinking that they can just wear the outfits during the day, you know, when the kids are here, but we throw a party for older people, like teenagers, and that's when they have the fangs and makeup and stuff. I dropped the animatronics off back at the house for now, but I'm going to need them again after work because I'm don't have all of their measurements, and I would like to get Goldie's too, just in case he's awake by Halloween. Also, I've got uniforms for me and you employees. I want to be here on Halloween, so I figured I might as well get a costume, too."

Zoe sat across from her friend. "Can I see these costumes?"

"Well, I haven't actually made them yet, but I've got all the fabric right here," she replied, gesturing to the box. "And I've got the design for the uniforms." She reached into the box and pulled out a large notebook. She flipped a few pages, then set it on the table and pushed it towards Zoe.

"They look nice," Zoe commented. The uniforms looked basically like their normal ones, but instead of being completely purple, the pants and tie were black, and the shirt was orange.

"I wanted to add some other details," Raina said, taking the notebook back, "but I decided to leave that up to you guys, just in case you already had costumes planned."

Zoe shook her head. "I didn't, but I guess you've solved that problem."

Raina put her notebook back into the box and closed it up. "Well, I'm going to take this back to my store. I'll be back later today to get the rest of their measurements."

Zoe nodded. "Okay. See you later."

 _ **xXx**_

*Halloween*

Chica tied on a torn up apron and looked at herself in the mirror of the master bedroom. Instead of her usual, cheerfully bright yellow outfit, she was wearing a greenish yellow dress with a bunch of rips and holes.

"Do I look okay?" Springtrap asked, straightening her neon green top hat.

"You look fine," Freddy assured her. He donned a tattered, dark brown dress shirt and a black waistcoat with a bunch of small rips in it.

"Could you zip this up for me, please?" Mari asked, turning around so her back was facing Chica.

"Sure." Chica zipped up the back of Mari's black leotard. "Do you need me to tie the bow, too?"

Mari nodded. "Yes please." She passed a white, ripped up ribbon to Chica, who began tying it into a bow.

"You guys excited?" Soringtrap asked as she buttoned up her black tuxedo jacket.

Chica shrugged. "I guess so."

Freddy glanced up at her as he slipped on his shoes. "I thought you would be more excited, Chica. You always seem so happy about everything else."

Pink giggled in her head. _How are you going to answer this one?_

Chica ignored them and smiled. "I'm just kind of tired, that's all."

 _You're not supposed to be able to get tired,_ Blue commented. _You're a robot._

Chica stepped away from Mari. "All done."

Mari smiled. "Thanks."

The sound of a doorbell echoed through the house. "That must be Zoe and Raina," Springtrap said.

Suddenly, Mangle, Tia, Tonnie, and BB all poked their heads in the doorway. "You guys ready?"

Chica plastered a smile on her face. "Yep! Let's go!" She skipped out of the room after the four Toys. The other three followed behind her.

"You guys look great," Zoe commented as they walked into the living room. Foxy, Bonnie, and Teddy were already there, lounging on the couch in their own tattered costumes.

"Raina did a great job," Tia chirped, twirling around in her ripped up magenta skirt.

"Is Goldie awake?" BB asked, looking up at Zoe hopefully.

Zoe sighed. "Unfortunately, no. Springtrap, you'll be the only one showing people to their tables. I would get someone else to do it with you, but you and Goldie were meant to have matching costumes, and I don't think his would be able to fit anyone else."

"Aww, come on guys!" Raina smiled. "Cheer up! It's your first Halloween! Besides, Goldie will be here next year! There's nothing to be sad about."

Zoe nodded. "She's right. Let's get to the pizzeria and get this show on the road!"

 _ **xXx**_

 _Goldie was starting to get sick of these nightmares._

 _He thought back to the dream he had the night Mari found her music box. He was in the same place now that he had been in that dream, sitting on a chair at a table with two other people. He must have been a child again, because everything looked slightly larger than normal and his legs were too short to touch the floor._

 _He looked around. Another child sat on a chair next to him, a girl with dirty blond hair and brown eyes. She was smiling and bouncing up and down in her seat like she was excited. A tall man with the same brown eyes as the girl walked around the table, placing dishes and cutlery in front of the chairs._

 _A doorbell rang throughout the house. The man looked up from the table. "Oh. That must be William." He smiled at Goldie and the girl. "I'll be right back."_

 _Goldie furrowed his eyebrows as the man walked out of the room. This dream was exactly the same as the one he had the night found the music box. He'd never had two dreams that were exactly the same before._

 _A few moments later, the man returned, followed by two other people. One looked about Zoe's age, maybe thirty years old or so. The other looked slightly younger. They both had the same black hair and blue eyes. It was obvious they were siblings. The older man was carrying a small child with bright red pigtails in his arms._

 _The man Goldie now remembered as Henry smiled at the older person, William. "I'm glad you could make it. And I see you brought your violin," he said, gesturing to an instrument case in William's hand._

 _William set the case on the floor. "Well, I know how much Charlie and Michael like it," he stated, setting the child he was carrying on a chair next to Goldie._

 _Henry cleared his throat. "And who is this?" he asked, glancing at the younger man._

 _William smiled apologetically. "Oh, I'm sorry. Where are my manners? Henry, this is Scott, my brother. He wants to become an employee, or at least help us with this one project."_

 _Scott shook Henry's outstretched hand. "It's nice to meet you."_

 _Henry gave him a strained smile. "Likewise." He turned to William. "Anyway, I wanted to talk to you about your blueprints."_

 _"Oh, come on, Henry." William grinned. "It's Christmas! We're on break! Besides, I'm sure the kids are hungry." He looked at the girl with the pigtails, who was jumping up and down in her seat happily._

 _Henry sighed and nodded. "You're right," he said, smiling. "I'll get the food."_

 _The first time Goldie had this dream, he wasn't even aware he was dreaming, and just reacted accordingly to whatever was happening. Last time, he had gotten excited at the mention of food and hadn't paid any attention to anything else. This time, however, he was oddly aware of the situation. As Henry brought out the food and set it on the table, he turned his full attention to William and his brother. They were having a hushed conversation at the end of the table. Goldie strained to hear them, but he couldn't make out much._

 _Henry placed some food on the plate in front of Goldie. Goldie looked at the meat, peas, and mashed potatoes on his plate. The first time he was in this dream, he had hungrily scarfed down all of his food, but now he ignored it and looked at the three men._

 _Scott and William had stopped talking, and now Scott was happily munching on his food. Henry and William, however, had left the room and were now having a heated conversation in the hallway outside._

 _Goldie glanced around. The other three were so engrossed in their food, that he was sure no one would notice if he left. He quietly slid off his chair and onto the floor, tiptoeing to the half-closed door._ _Goldie walked past the table and reached out, pushing the door open. He peeked out and saw William and Henry arguing near the living room door. Goldie quickly ran into the bathroom so he could spy on them._

 _"I didn't think your brother would be here!" Henry said, obviously annoyed._

 _William shrugged. "He just wants to be an employee. He doesn't want to own the company or anything."_

 _"I thought it was just going to be the two of us working on this. We can't afford to hire anyone right now!"_

 _"He can work for free," William insisted. "We don't have to pay him, at least not until we have the money."_

 _Goldie immediately lost interest in their conversation. They were just talking about money._

 _Goldie walked back to the dining room, bored. He couldn't reach his chair, so he pushed a pile of books from the corner to his chair and climbed up. He tried eating some food, but his clumsy toddler hands spilled most of it before it got to his mouth._

 _Eventually, William and Henry came back into the room and sat down. They ate their own food and talked with each other and Scott, occasionally making remarks about the kids; "Charlie's going to be starting kindergarten next year," "Michael is almost in first grade," and the like._

 _After a very boring half hour, when everyone was finished eating, they all crowded into the living room. The adults sat down on the blue couch and began talking, and the two girls started playing tag. Goldie would have joined them, but he decided to listen in on the mens' conversation, because he wanted to do something different this time. It was mostly about boring stuff, like politics and work, but eventually the brown-eyed girl, Charlie, went up to William and smiled. "Song! Song!" she chirped._

 _Goldie inhaled sharply. He'd forgotten about this part._

 _William smiled and ruffled her hair. "Okay. I'll go get my violin." He got up and disappeared through the living room door._

 _Goldie didn't hesitate. He was in control of the dream this time, and he was determined to avoid this next part._

 _He ran through the living room door and decided to shut himself in the bathroom until it was over._

 _Footsteps passed by the door as William walked back down the hallway. Goldie thought back to the first time he had this dream. In that version, he had been just as excited as Charlie to hear William's violin, but as soon as it had started playing, Goldie had been overcome with an odd sense of loss and sadness that grew more intense until his vision went black. When he woke up, Mari had said that he'd been sparking and twitching violently._

 _He didn't want that to happen again._

 _Goldie heard the faint sound of the violin from the living room, and he immediately covered his ears. After what seemed like forever, he finally uncovered his ears. He couldn't hear the violin, so he stood up and cautiously opened the door. He walked into the living room and looked around. William was just putting away his instrument. No one had seemed to notice that Goldie had been gone at all._

It's because I'm not following the memory, _Goldie thought._ They all think I'm still in there.

 _This had been where the dream had stopped before, so he wasn't quite sure what to do. Then Henry solved his problem by getting up and gesturing to William. "Now, Mr. Afton, if I could talk to you about those blueprints-"_

 _William nodded and stood up. "Yes, I believe I've stalled enough. Why don't we go into the dining room?"_

 _Henry walked towards the door to the hallway, William following close behind. Goldie walked after them, not bothering to be quiet since he knew they wouldn't notice him anyway._

 _They reached the dining room, and Henry paused. "Oh. I forgot them in my room. If you would excuse me." As Henry ran back out and William sat down at the table to wait, Goldie hopped back on the stack of books, clambered up his chair, and pulled himself onto the table._

 _"I showed your designs to some other mechanics and technicians to see what they thought of them," Henry said as he walked back into the room carrying four rolled up tubes of blue paper in his arms. He unfurled them and spread them out on the table for William to see. The blue paper was covered in white drawings and writing. "There's no doubting what you've achieved on a technical level," he said. "These are clearly state-of-the-art. There are just certain- design choices- that were made for these robots that we don't fully understand. We were hoping that you could shed some light on those."_

 _William shrugged. "She can dance. She can sing. She's equipped with built-in helium tech for inflating balloons right at her fingertips. She can take song requests. She can even dispense ice cream."_

 _Henry sighed. "With all due respect, those aren't the design choices we were curious about, Mr. Afton."_

 _William looked up. It took Goldie a second to realize he was staring straight at him. "Oh really?" William smirked. Instead of the sky blue colour they had been before, his eyes were now a dark purple. "Then what were they?"_

 _Everything went black._

 ** _xXx_**

BB grinned, examining his new fangs in the mirror of the boys' bathroom. "I look awesome."

"I wonder how much it would hurt if you bit someone with these," Foxy wondered aloud, smiling at his own reflection.

"Probably a lot," Bonnie replied, fitting one last fang over one of his teeth.

Teddy snorted. "Not that we would know."

"How about we try _not_ to bite anyone?" Mangle suggested. "You guys remember those things Dad told us about the Bite of '87."

Foxy rolled his eyes- well, _eye_. "Just a buncha stupid rumours. You don't actually believe all that, do ya?"

Tonnie shrugged. "Considering the things Mom told us about the old animatronics, it could be true."

"It doesn't matter whether it's true or not," Freddy commented, straightening his top hat. "It won't happen now, got it?" He glared accusingly at Bonnie, Teddy, and Foxy.

Bonnie rolled his eyes. "We wouldn't _actually_ bite anyone. Geez."

"Yeah, we're not stupid," Teddy said.

Freddy raised an eyebrow. "Are you quite sure about that?" Teddy smacked him on the arm.

BB put his hat on. "We should probably get going. The party's going to start soon." He opend the door and left the bathroom. He turned down the hallway just as the door to Parts and Service opened. Goldie walked out of the room, looking confused and dazed.

BB was struck dumb for a moment. Then he shrieked with joy and ran towards the animatronic. "Goldie! You're awake!" He yelled, tackling him in a hug.

Goldie staggered backwards from the impact. "BB? How long have I been out?"

BB let go of Goldie and backed away. "About a week. It's Halloween. You missed work today, but we're going to have a party. Raina made you a costume, too."

Suddenly, the door to the girls' bathroom slammed open, and Mari, Springtrap, Tia, and Chica ran out. "Goldie's awake?" they exclaimed simultaniously.

Mangle, Tonnie, Freddy, Foxy, Bonnie, and Teddy dashed out of the boys' bathroom. "Goldie's awake?"

Everyone stared at him for a moment. Then they all swarmed around him, everyone speaking at once. Goldie looked kind of nervous, probably because they already had their fangs and claws on. They did look pretty terrifying.

But there was one person who hadn't crowded around Goldie. Chica was standing off to the side, her brow furrowed. She occasionally muttered something under her breath.

BB was confused. Wasn't she excited that Goldie was back? Shouldn't she be happy?

He sighed. Whatever. It wasn't his business.

 _ **xXx**_

Jeremy was smiling as he walked into the restaurant before the party. "Okay. Which one of you can guess who I am?"

Mike, who was wearing a dark cape over his Halloween uniform, shrugged. "Dunno."

Zoe shoved a black witch hat on her head. "I'm guessing... an anime character."

"But which one?"

Raina slung on a pair of pixie wings. "Look, none of us know. Just tell us."

"I'm Armin!" Jeremy exclaimed, as though it were obvious. "You know, from Attack On Titan?"

"We don't watch anime," Mike said. He shoved a set of vampire teeth in his mouth. "How were we supposed to know?"

Jeremy rolled his eyes. "Never mind."

"Mom?"

Chica looked up from the pizza box in her lap to see Goldie wearing a torn-up black tuxedo and a neon green hat. He had fangs in his mouth and claws set over his fingernails. He looked kind of nervous.

Zoe smiled. "Hey, Goldie. You look great!"

He tensed his shoulders. "I'm not so sure. Don't you think it's too- you know- scary?"

"If you think that's too scary, you obviously haven't seen Mr. Graves's costume," Bonnie yelled from where he was sitting on the stage.

"What is he dressed as?" Tia asked curiously, sitting down on a table.

"You haven't seen him?" Freddy raised an eyebrow.

Chica grinned. "Well, you're in for a surprise."

"Hey guys," a voice said from the hall. A person walked into the room, but instead of a head, there was a large, red, cardboard telephone sitting on their shoulders. The person reached up and pulled the phone off, revealing Scott's smiling face.

"No offense, but that's a pretty pathetic costume," Mike commented.

"Says the king of last-minute costumes," Raina snorted. Mike gave her a light punch on the shoulder.

"I was in a rush," Scott said. "I couldn't think of anything."

"It was my idea," Fritz claimed, walking in behind Scott. He had painted his face orange and black to look like a jack-o-lantern.

"Hey, where is Vincent anyway?" Jeremy wondered.

"Right here," a voice called from behind Fritz, who moved out of the way so Vincent could walk in. He had metal blades poking out of his skin down the length of his arms and legs- at least that's what it looked like. Chica knew it was fake. Fake blood dripped from the blades, and some even seemed to be dribbling from his mouth. His eyes were dark purple, and when he smiled, she saw that his teeth were bloodstained metal fangs similar to her own.

 _I knew it!_ Magenta's voice shouted in Chica's head.

 _It's him_ , Yellow Green stated. _It's got to be_.

 _Are you talking about Vincent?_ Chica thought back. _You do realize that's just a costume, right?_

 _Don't be so sure._ Amber's voice held a hint of a warning.

 _Well, whether it is him or not, be careful around Vincent from now on, okay?_ Blue requested.

Chica sighed. _I don't even know who "he" is, but sure. Whatever. I'll be careful_.

"Hey, should we open the doors?"

Chica turned around to see Mangle and Tonnie at the doors, staring outside at a large crowd of people. Every single person outside was wearing a costume, and some of them were even dressed as the animatronics.

Vincent hesitated. "Sure." He turned to Zoe, Mike, Fritz, and Jeremy. "But all four of you- and yes, fine, you too, Raina- have to make sure that we don't get a repeat of the fangirl incident. I've still got bruises from that."

 **ayy happy halloween motherfuckers**


	29. Chapter 29

**2014 me: I'm writing a fanfiction! I'm so excited! I'm going to update this every chance I get! *proceeds to update story at least every second day***

 **2016 me: *uploads a short filler chapter after not updating for a month* nice**

 **small shout out to StarCre8tion for correcting some mistakes in past chapters**

 **Chapter 29**

 _"Hey, are you okay?"_

 _Goldie opened his eyes to see an odd yellowish-orange light. He furrowed his eyebrows, confused. He couldn't see much of anything. He squinted and spotted a weird looking shape within the light. After a few moments, the light faded somewhat, leaving behind a humanoid figure with wisps of yellow-orange mist curling off it. He and the odd silhouette were in a black room that was so dark, they may as well have been standing in a void._

 _It drifted forward. "Hello? Are you alright?" it asked again._

 _Goldie was confused. He'd never had a dream like this before. "Um, yeah."_

 _The figure glanced around. "Where are they?" it muttered under its breath. "They're usually here by now..."_

 _"Um, who are you talking about?" Goldie asked._

 _As though on cue, a bright light filled the room, and Goldie had to avert his eyes. When he looked back, the room was filled with more multicoloured sillouhettes._

 _A magenta one giggled. "Ooh, looks like we have a new friend!"_

 _"Oh, lay off them," ordered a grey one standing in the back next to a dark blue one._

 _"I don't recall you telling us to back off_ before _," an amber one remarked._

 _"And when you did decide that we should stop, you had to be all dramatic and give her this speech about why we're talking to only her," a violet one at the edge of the group griped._

 _If the grey one had a face, Goldie imagined that it would be smiling. "What can I say? I had wanted to be an actress in my life."_

 _All the other figures groaned collectively. Aside from him, there appeared to be ten other silhouettes in all. "Please don't start telling us your life story again," an amber-coloured one sighed._

 _"What are you?" Goldie asked. He was seriously confused. He didn't seem to have the figure of a child anymore; in fact, he didn't seem to look much like a human at all. All he was was a slightly humanoid blob of yellow light. This had never happened before._

 _The yellow-orange silhouette shrugged. "Heck if I know. These guys have been annoying me ever since the night after I was built. I had a nightmare the first night, but after that, they started bugging me non-stop. This happens every night. But I suppose it's better than having nightmares every night, like you used to."_

 _Goldie blanched. How did this thing know about his nightmares? What did it mean by "used to" have nightmares? He still had them every night! Well, with this one dream being an exception (so far). And what did it mean, it was "built"? That made no sense! Unless-_

 _"Are you an animatronic?"_

 _The question just burst out; he wasn't even thinking. But the yellow-orange figure nodded. "Hi, Goldie."_

 _It didn't make any sense. And yet it made perfect sense. But he was still confused._

 _The yellow-orange figure must have somehow noticed how confused he was, because it started talking. "Don't worry, I was confused at first, but there's a pretty simple explanation for this."_

 _"Well,_ mostly _simple," a blue silhouette commented._

 _The yellow-orange one nodded. "Yeah. I guess it_ is _kind of complicated. And it's a really long explanation, so I'm going to have to tell you later. We're running out of time. It's almost eight a.m."_

 _"It's almost eight?" Goldie was taken aback. "But I just got to sleep!"_

 _The yellow-orange silhouette shrugged. "I know, I know, it doesn't seem like it's been ten hours._ _That's the thing with dreams. They always seem shorter than they actually are._ _How about we meet up during our 2 p.m. break?" it suggested. "We'll explain everything then."_

 _"But how will I know which one is you?" Goldie asked. He looked around. The silhouettes were fading, one by one, as he began to wake up._

 _"I'll come to you," it replied. "Just be in the security guards' office during break."_ _Goldie nodded._

 _"I'll see you then!" the yellow-orange figure called as the silhouettes' light flickered out, and Goldie's vision went black._

 _ **xXx**_

Chica absent-mindedly tapped out a rhythm on her drums as she waited for work to start. It was 9:54, and there was a small crowd of children (with only two fangirls that she could see, thank god) outside the doors. She wondered why they didn't just open up the restaurant already.

She was nervous about her meeting with Goldie. What if he listened to her story and thought there was something wrong with her programming? What if he thought she was just making it all up to mess with him?

 _Just relax,_ Pink said in a calming tone. _Everything will be fine._

 _Are you sure?_ Chica fired back.

None of the voices replied.

She sighed and set down her drumsticks. _That's what I thought._

 ** _xXx_**

Goldie was also apprehensive about the meeting. He was curious as to which animatronic it would be. He hoped it wasn't Bonnie, Teddy, or Foxy. They could be nice at times, but those three were pretty self-centred and obnoxious. He decided he didn't want it to be Freddy or Springtrap, either. They were kinda nice too, but they were also really bossy.

He glanced up at the clock above the stage as he lead a family to a table. 2:55 p.m. Just a few more minutes.

The family sat down, and he gave them a big smile. "Welcome to Freddy Fazbear's," he said, passing each of them a menu. "A waiter will come by to take your order soon. In the meantime, can I get you some drinks?"

As the three children whined for ice cream and their parents tried to talk over them, Goldie took a quick look around the restaurant. They seemed to be doing pretty well today. The kids must have gotten overwhelming for Freddy, Bonnie, and Chica up on the stage, because Foxy and Mangle had just called out that there was a treasure hunt in Pirates' Cove. All the kids, including the ones trying to climb up onto the stage, immediately rushed over to Pirates' Cove, screaming and yelling excitedly. Goldie knew that in a few minutes, the kids would get to be too much for the pirate foxes, and Mari and BB would call up a game of hide-and-seek.

While one of the parents at Goldie's table did their best to shut up their three kids, the other one gave Goldie their orders. "Um, could we get one lemonade, two chocolate milks, and two Cokes please?"

The orders were immediately saved into Goldie's software. "Coming right up," he said with a smile. He sent the orders off to Tia, who was in the kitchen. Since Goldie and Springtrap were given the job of managing phone calls and reservations, they'd been too busy to serve the food, so that job was given to Teddy and Tonnie. Tia was the only one in the kitchen, a job she seemed completely fine with. Besides, she was really good at making pizza.

A ringing sound resonated in Goldie's head. His and Spring's software was connected to the Fazbear phone line, so every time someone called, it would go straight to them. He looked around and saw that Springtrap was busy leading a family to a table, so he quickly answered the call. "Hello, this is Freddy Fazbear's, how may I help you?"

"Hello," said a voice on the other end. "Could I get two large cheese pizzas and two large pepperoni, please?"

Goldie filed the order in his head. "Coming right up. Your address, please?" The person told him. "Alright. Thank you," he said, and sent the order off to Tia.

Raina walked in the front doors and skirted around a group of children drawing on the chairs. "Any more pizzas I need to deliver?" She had decided to take on the job of pizza delivery, and for free. She claimed that she already got a sufficient amount of money from her clothing store, so she didn't need to be paid for another job. She already knew that Vincent and Scott were having trouble with finances.

"Just one more order that I know of," Goldie answered. He glanced back up at the clock. It was 2:58. Almost done.

 ** _xXx_**

Goldie was glad when their two hour break started. He liked working in the pizzeria, but sometimes the people just got to be too much.

He looked around at the animatronics in the dining room. Foxy, Bonnie, and Teddy were all there, which was good, because that meant one of them wasn't the person he'd be meeting. Neither Freddy nor Springtrap were there, but he was pretty sure they were in the bathroom, getting another one of Spring's oil leaks cleaned up. Still, it was still possible that it would be one of them. Some of the others presumably went off to the bathroom to change into their everyday outfits, but any one of them could be waiting for him in the security office.

Goldie let his mind wander as he began walking down the hall. There was something other than the meeting that he was concerned about. Ever since he woke up on Halloween, he'd felt- odd. And it wasn't the normal kind of feeling, like emotions and stuff, it was the rest of him. When he stepped outside to go home after the Halloween party, he shivered every time the wind blew his way. He was fairly sure that was "cold". When Tia and Chica had been playing tag inside the house and Tia crashed into him, knocking him over and making him hit his head on the coffee table, he was sure that what he felt then was "pain". He didn't know why that was happening, but he was hoping that whoever he was going to meet would have an explanation.

He reached the security office and looked around. No one was there yet. He'd have to wait.

He sat down in the chair behind the desk. After a couple minutes, he heard footsteps coming down the hall towards him. He looked up and saw Chica in the doorway of the office.

There was no way he'd be able to hide his shock. He'd been thinking about who it might be, but he'd never once considered Chica. She was so childish and carefree. It was hard to imagine her as the yellow-orange silhouette from last night. She was still wearing her frilly yellow work dress and orange stockings, but she'd taken off her apron and shoes, and she looked almost like a child.

He stood up. "Chica. Hi."

Chica motioned for him to sit down again. "Stay sitting. This is going to take a while."

He sat back down, and Chica pulled up a chair to the other side of the desk. "So, I suppose I should start with the nightmares."

 _This is gonna be good_ , said a voice in Goldie's head. He jumped in surprise and almost fell out of his chair.

Chica sighed. "I told you not to do that until _after_ I told him," she muttered. Goldie thought she was talking to him, but then a different voice replied. _Sorry about her. Continue._

Chica nodded and opened her mouth to speak, but Goldie interrupted. "What was that?"

"Remember all those silhouettes from last night?" Chica asked. Goldie nodded. "That's them."

 _How about you just start with us?_ another voice suggested. _I mean, he's already heard us. You might as well._

"Alright then." Chica heaved a great sigh. "Get comfy, Goldie. This is going to take a while.

"I only ever had one nightmare, and that was the one with the burning building and the man in purple. After that, these guys started talking to me. They interrupted my dreams and kept me from having nightmares. It was annoying, dealing with them, but I got used to it pretty quickly."

"Are they animatronics, too?" Goldie asked.

Chica nodded. "Yes, but they don't know it during the daytime. They're in these animatronic forms, but it's mostly just their software and programming and stuff that's keeping them running. These guys are actually ghosts, and the robots are just their vessels. The robots are just running on their own, for the most part. They're only completely in control the robots at night, or anytime they're asleep. The robots will do what their programming tells them to do, and during the day, they're exactly what they're supposed to be- just learning AIs." She paused to let that sink in, then continued. "I know it's really confusing, but that was the best way I could explain it."

"But why us?" Goldie sat forward in his chair. "Why just you and me?"

Chica shrugged. "Honestly, I have no idea why they picked me. It could have been the fact that I was the last to settle into our bodies. I mean, Grey went on this big rant about how I 'went through more than the others did' and how I'm 'more experienced with suffering' or whatever, but she was just being dramatic."

"Grey? You mean the grey figure?"

 _The one and only,_ a voice said.

"But they picked you because of your nightmares," Chica continued. "Apparently, when your nightmares get to a certain point, all the other animatronics will remember, and they won't be in their right minds. They'll do something bad, and they're not sure that they'll be able to control themselves."

"But why do I have these nightmares?" Goldie asked. "What point do they have to get to to make this bad thing happen?"

Chica hesitated. "Well, the thing is, the two of us are also ghosts. Most of us were killed, but your death was- different. Those series of nightmares- the ones with the little yellow bear plushie- they're all leading up to your death. And they're real memories, too. Not like that dream you had before you woke up."

Goldie was surprised. She knew about the golden plush? And about the dream with Henry and William and the others? How did she find out?

 _We told her,_ one of the voices said. _We had to explain._

Goldie took a deep breath and nodded. "Okay. But how were you able to interfere with our dreams? And what is wrong with those memories? Why would that happen to someone?"

"Well, all of your dreams are memories," Chica stated. "Just one or two of them have been tampered with. None of us are quite sure about what happened in your life. The dreams with the plush would have continued every time you went to sleep, but these guys were able to gather enough energy to interfere and replace your dream from the night you tried to kill Fritz with a different memory."

 _Unfortunately, it was one that included me_ , a voice interrupted. Goldie recognized it as the voice of the dark blue silhouette. _I was sucked into the dream with you._

"They were able to do that a couple of times," Chica said. "But your nightmares were still progressing. They had no choice but to dig around in your mind and surface of of your most traumatic memories to make you remember. They didn't have to do that with me, because we were all new to our vessels, and mine was the last to settle in completely. Your memories of your life should start returning soon, like mine did. But the memories of yours that have been changed- that's still a mystery to all of us. Only a spirit that's been conserving its energy for decades would be strong enough to change other people's thoughts and memories even a little bit. We're thinking that in that dream with Henry and William, some ghost played with your memories to make it seem like William was up to something. I remember meeting him once in my life, and he was as nice as a person could be. And that first nightmare that we had- we're thinking that the same spirit that changed your memory changed it so that the man in purple would look like Vincent. We think that there's some ghost that's angry with both of them that's trying to fuck up Vincent's life and maybe anger William's own ghost. Or it could be William himself changing the memories. Maybe when you get your old memories back we'll be able to figure it out." She stopped and took a deep breath. "Alright. I think that covers everything. Any questions?"

Goldie took a good long look at Chica. Despite the frilly dress and colourful stockings, she looked much less like a child. Her jaw was set, and her eyes practically shone with determination. She was definitely telling the truth, or at least she believed she was.

He took a deep breath. "Just one."

"Fire away."

"Will I start hearing all these voices?"

For the first time in the ten minutes they'd been there, Chica smiled. "Yep."

 _Prepare to be annoyed!_ a voice yelled in his head.

He sighed. "Oh, boy."

 **you have no idea how many times i accidentally typed "memeories" instead of "memories" in this chapter**

 **anyway i'm going to try to get a christmas chapter up sometime next month but just don't be surprised if there isn't one**


	30. Chapter 30

**Chapter 30**

Fritz settled into his chair behind the desk in the security office and picked up the tablet. He didn't even know why he had to keep doing this job. No one would be crazy enough to break into Freddy Fazbear's pizzeria.

Scott hadn't called him since those first few days on the job. He already knew what he was doing, so he didn't really need Scott's guidance. Scott usually patrolled the restaurant at random and made sure everything was in order for the next day while Fritz sat in the office and flicked through the cameras. Right now, Scott was in the kitchen, cleaning up the mess Tia had made earlier.

Suddenly, the phone ran, and Fritz was so surprised, he almost fell out of his chair. He scrambled to pick up the phone. He jammed the receiver to his ear, straightening his glasses as he did so. "Hello?" he said frantically. Something serious must have happened if Scott was calling him now.

"Hey, Fritz," Scott greeted calmly, the sound of clattering dishes in the background. It didn't sound like anything was wrong.

"What's going on?" Fritz asked curiously. "Is something wrong?"

Scott chuckled. "No, no, nothing's wrong. I just wanted to talk to you."

Fritz was still skeptical. "About what?"

"Um, it's about Vincent."

"What about him?"

"It's just kind of a warning." Scott sounded hesitant. "You remember what happened last night?"

Fritz nodded. "Yep." At around 2:30 the previous night, Vincent had come out of his room in his pyjamas and looked around aimlessly. Then he started walking towards Fritz, but Scott had just been coming out of the Parts and Service room and got Vincent back in his room before he could reach the office. It had been another thing to add to Fritz's list of weird things about his boss.

Fritz blanched. He hadn't even realized he had a list until then. Thinking about it now, he realized that there were a lot of strange things about Vincent Graves. The odd way he reacted on that first day with the animatronics, his decreasing temper, the odd pain-sharing thing he had with Springtrap that everybody else seemed to put off as some weird coincidence- yes, there were quite a few strange things about his boss.

"In case you hadn't already guessed, he tends to sleepwalk," Scott continued, snapping Fritz out of his thoughts. "He's been doing that more often recently, so I figured I might as well warn you. I mean, he doesn't usually make it out of his room, but sometimes he does, so just, you know, don't freak out or anything if you see him do that again..." The sentence tapered off, like he wanted to say something else but wasn't sure how to put it.

"Anything else?" Fritz prompted.

"Ah..." Scott paused, as though trying to find the right words. "When he sleepwalks, he can also get a little- violent."

Fritz raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean by 'violent?' How 'violent' does he get, exactly?"

Scott took a deep breath. "Like- old animatronic violent."

Fritz inhaled sharply. "That's pretty violent."

"Yeah, but you should be fine. He doesn't make it out of his very often, like I said before, but if he does, he should ignore you. Well, as long as you stay really still and quiet. But you'd survive, probably. You should be fine."

Fritz was suspicious. "Are you doing that thing again?"

"What thing?" Scott asked curiously.

"You know, that thing where you completely down play a situation that could actually be possibly fatal? You did that a lot when I worked here the first time."

"No I'm not."

"You hesitated."

"No I didn't."

"Yeah, you did."

Scott sighed. "Okay, maybe a little. But seriously, as long as you don't move or speak, he'll ignore you and just wander away. Then I'll come get him and put him back in his room. Okay?"

Fritz furrowed his eyebrows. He'd never really trusted Scott when he worked there a decade or so ago, and those feelings hadn't changed at all over the years. He had an odd feeling that Scott was lying. Nevertheless, he nodded. "Stay still, keep quiet. Got it." He reached across the desk and hung up.

 _ **xXx**_

 ***The next day***

Zoe sat in her chair in the Parts and Service room, setting her toolbox down at her feet. She was tempted to ask Vincent for a day off so she could focus a bit more on her auto repair shop, but despite his weirdly decreasing temper, he was still a little scary.

She absentmindedly tapped on the control panel in front of her. She was just waiting on Fritz. The two of them had agreed to meet up that morning so they could try to fix whatever it was about the animatronics that made them react so weirdly to light at night time. They had discussed it before, but they'd never had much time since he was on the night shift and she worked during the day. Vincent had actually approached her earlier and told her to take this one day off so she and Fritz could fix that problem with the robots. She had argued that it wasn't fair for him to make Fritz stay awake for that long just so they could fix a minor glitch, but Vincent actually offered to take the night shift for Fritz the next night. She thought that was strangely kind of him, and she didn't protest any further.

The door opened and Fritz walked in, looking exhausted. He plunked hnis laptop on the control panel and collapsed in his own chair opposite Zoe.

"You look tired," Zoe observed.

He nodded, rubbing his eyes behind his glasses. "Yeah. I've been on edge all night. Scott decided to call and tell me that Vincent sleepwalks. I usually have a short nap while I'm working, but I wasn't able to sleep at all."

Zoe furrowed her brow. "Why were so worried? A lot of people sleepwalk, and they're usually fine. I remember this one time in high school when Raina, Mike, Jeremy, and I all had a sleepover at Raina's house, and Mike woke up in the kitchen, laying on the counter." She chuckled at the memory.

Fritz sighed. "Yeah, but Scott told me that Vincent gets really violent when he sleepwalks."

"Violent? Like, how violent exactly?"

"Old animatronic violent."

Zoe inhaled sharply. "That's pretty violent."

"That's what I said!" Fritz exclaimed. "It's already been an hour since my shift ended, and my hands are still shaking. Scott said that as long as I stay silent and still, he _should_ ignore me, and if he does get me, I _should_ survive, _probably._ "

Zoe rested her chin on her hand. "That's so weird. Thinking about it, there are actually a lot of weird things about Vincent. His decreasing temper-"

"And that weird pain sharing thing he has with Spring-" Fritz added.

"The weird way he reacted on that first day with the animatronics-"

"The fact that he literally sleeps inside the pizzeria and not in an actual house-"

"And he actually had a room built specifically for that purpose, so he obviously planned to be staying here and it's not just a last resort-"

"And now this." Fritz finished. "I wish we knew more about him. I mean, if these things are in any way connected with those rumours about him from 1987-"

"But how could they be?" Zoe interrupted. "He's twenty-five years old. He would have been born in 1991. That's four years after 1987."

He shrugged in response. "A lot of people get plastic surgery to look younger these days. He might be older than he looks."

Zoe thought about it. "Well, if he got plastic surgery all over his fucking body, that might explain all the scars."

Fritz leaned forward, suddenly wide awake. "Scars?"

Zoe told him about the day they'd started working on the animatronics, when she had gone for a walk around the pizzeria and wandered into Vincent's room.

"But the scars didn't look like plastic surgery," she said. "They were in random places, and a bunch of them were scabs, like they'd been recently reopened. I asked him about it, and he just said they were from an accident. He didn't elaborate at all." She smiled. "Man, if this were a mystery novel, we'd just bust right into his room and start looking for clues."

Fritz shot up straight in his chair. "Why don't we?"

She raised an eyebrow. "What? Dude, this isn't Scooby Doo. I know Vincent's been a lot less angry lately, but if those rumours about the murders are true, he wouldn't hesitate to kill us. We wouldn't just walk out of there with all the answers and not have any consequences."

"I know, but if those rumours are true, and we figured it out and had proof-"

"Then we'd catch a murderer," Zoe finished. "I don't know, Fritz. I'm just not too sure about this." She really was curious to know more Vincent, but poking around in people's personal stuff just seemed wrong.

"I know, I know, everyone deserves their personal space," Fritz said, as though he had just read her mind, "but aren't you curious?"

Zoe had to admit, she was. She'd always been to curious for her own good. But still, she was hesitant. "I don't know, Fritz. If we get caught-"

"We'd make something up," he said. "I'm pretty okay at lying. I could think of an excuse."

Zoe thought about it. She actually kind of liked his idea, and she knew that if they wanted to know more about Vincent, this was really their only option. But still...

"How about we ask Scott first?" she suggested. "Vincent seems to care about Scott, and that one day when I'd asked him why Scott is the only one he seems to care about, he said it was because Scott saved his life. If that's somehow connected with the scars, then maybe Scott could give us some answers. And if he doesn't tell us anything, we can go ahead with your idea."

Fritz nodded. "Yeah. Let's do that. But first, we should get working. We don't want Vincent to come in here and see us slacking off."


	31. Chapter 31

**zoe is such a shithead i'm sorry for this extremely bad character but i can't get rid of her so i guess we're stuck with her**

 **she's going to have a sad backstory though (because that's the only way i can do any kind of character development i'm sOrRy)**

 **Chapter 31**

 ***Two days later***

Fritz and Zoe had asked Vincent for a couple more days to work on the animatronics programming and any upgrades they might be able to make. Of course, that was just an excuse so that they would both be there on the same day and be able to carry out Fritz's original idea if Scott didn't tell them anything. She was the one who was going to ask Scott about Vincent, but she wished Fritz could do it.

"I've known Scott for quite a while, and our relationship has always been pretty rocky," Fritz had said the day before. "We've never really trusted each other at all. Also, I'm not really the best at talking to people. I wouldn't know where to start. You seem more confident than I am. I think you should be the one to ask him."

So there Zoe was at 8 o'clock that morning. Vincent hadn't left his room yet, so she had some time.

She found Scott in the dining room, wiping down the tables and replacing the dirty tablecloths with clean ones. She wasn't one-hundred percent sure how start. Should she be subtle and somehow work it into a conversation? Or should she be up front about it and directly ask him?

She decided to go with the second option.

Zoe marched into the room, grabbed Scott's shoulders, and spun him around to face her. "Scott, I want you to tell me how Vincent got all those scars."

The tablecloths in Scott's hand fell to the floor. "What?"

She took a deep breath. "Scott, I asked Vincent about those scars that I saw on him, and he said something about an accident. He also mentioned that you saved his life. But he didn't elaborate at all, and I've been curious. I want to know what he was talking about."

Scott blinked at her, processing this. Then he grabbed Zoe's wrists and removed her hands from his shoulders. "Look, Zoe," he sighed, "I would love to tell you. I would love to tell anyone. But I can't. Sorry."

"But-"

"Zoe." He tightened his grip on her wrists. "I can't tell you anything. I can't even tell you why I can't tell you. I'm sorry. It'll be much less dangerous for you, for everyone, if you just let it go. Forget you saw anything. Please."

Zoe was taken aback by this response. She had expected him to protest, of course, but this was slightly surprising. Why would telling her be dangerous? Why couldn't he tell her?

He let go of her and picked up the tablecloths. "Sorry, Zoe." He went back to working, as though she wasn't even there.

Zoe turned and started walking back to Parts and Service, pulling her phone out of her pocket. She sent a quick text to Fritz:

 _We're going with your idea._

 ** _xXx_**

Springtrap sighed as her internal alarm clock beeped in her head. She subconciously shut it off and sat up in bed as her software automatically switched from Night Mode to Day Mode.

Chica and Goldie were already up and dressed in their work clothes, sitting on the floor and talking. Their conversation stopped abruptly as the other three they shared the room with woke up. Spring was curious about this, but Mari and Freddy were already getting dressed for work, so she figured she should too if she didn't want to be late (again).

She sighed once again and started getting ready.

 ** _xXx_**

An hour later, all the animatronics were at the pizzeria and doing their designated jobs, though Springtrap was doing it rather reluctantly. Not that she didn't like her job, of course. It was just that she would rather be drawing. She never really kept her drawings as she had no where to keep them, but she enjoyed it anyway. She hadn't had any time to draw the day before, and her mind (or rather, _software_ ) was just swimming with ideas.

She plastered on a smile as she approached a family of four sitting at a table. "Hello. What can I get you?"

As the family placed their order, Springtrap's thoughts turned to her drawings. She couldn't wait for their 3 o'clock break, when she'd be free to draw again.

She looked up and saw one of the parents staring at her expectedly. She gave them an apologetic smile. "I'm sorry, could you repeat that?"

"We would like a family-size cheese pizza and some water, please."

Spring nodded and sent the order off to Tia. "Coming right up," she said, turning and walking towards another waiting family.

 ** _xXx_**

At 3 o'clock, Springtrap shucked off her jacket and rolled up her sleeves. She slapped a piece of paper onto the table in front of her and set a bucket of pencil crayons next to it. Poising a pencil over the paper, she thought for a moment, unsure of where to start. She barely noticed everyone else bustling about, some cleaning up for their afternoon shift, others leaving the restaurant to take a walk, and in Tonnie's case, eating cookies on a table while Mangle swung from light fixtures and climbed up walls like Spiderman. She finally decided on an idea and let her pencil fly across the paper, creating curved lines and sharp corners, gradually bringing all the lines together into one big picture. Then she switched out her pencil for the coloured pencils and started colouring, expertly shading in shadows and blending colours. Within thirty minutes, she had finished.

She looked down at her drawing with pride. This one was of a tall humanoid animatronic. It had faceplates, like them, but its face was stuck in only one expression, with closed eyes and an open, smiling mouth. It had a pink skirt and a purple crop top kind of thing with purple ballet slippers.

"What are you drawing?"

Springtrap whirled around in surprise to see Scott standing behind her, staring down at her drawing. She shrugged. "Dunno. A ballerina, I guess." She picked up the paper and handed it to him to see.

He studied the picture for a moment, then asked hesitantly, "Does she have a name?"

"Ballora," Spring blurted automatically, though she wan't sure why. The name just felt right to her.

"Have you shown your drawings to anyone else?" he asked.

She shook her head. "No. Not yet. Why?"

He studied the picture for a few more seconds, then handed it back to her. "You're really good at this, but you might not want to show these to anyone."

Springtrap was confused now. If he thought her drawings were good, why didn't he want her to show anyone? "What? Why not?"

Scott glanced around cautiously, as though making sure no one was listening. "Well, knowing these guys, word will spread, and it'll get to Vincent. I don't think he should see these."

"Why not?" she asked curiously. "What's wrong with them?"

"Nothing's wrong with them, really," Scott said. "I just- please, just promise me you won't show this to anyone else." He looked at her imploringly.

She hesitated. She really enjoyed drawing, and she wanted to be able to share her talent with her friends. But a moment later, she found herself agreeing. "Alright. I don't know why, but okay. I won't tell a soul."


	32. Chapter 32

**yOU GUYS I GOT THE SILVER EYES FOR CHRISTMAS I CAN FINALLY READ IT**

 **I ALSO GOT A SHIRT WITH A PICTURE OF THE ANIMATRONICS ON IT I'M SO HAPPY**

 **I GOT FOUR BOOKS THIS YEAR THIS IS FUCKING GREAT**

 **i also got a sweater that says "kinda don't care" on it which literally sums up my entire existence tbh**

 **Chapter 32**

 ***December 7th***

Chica loved the decorations, but she wasn't too sure about the snow.

Mangle was hanging from the rafters, stringing sparkling blue tinsel along the ceiling, while Tonnie stood on a ladder and hung paper snowflakes along the strings. Mari and BB sat in their Prize Corner, putting plushes and candy in boxes and wrapping them in shiny silver paper. Foxy, Bonnie, and Teddy had taken down the purple curtains of Pirate's Cove and were replacing them with red and green striped ones that Raina had made the week prior, while Freddy and Springtrap did the same with the tablecloths. Tia was off decorating the party rooms with Raina, Mike, and Jeremy. Zoe and Fritz were blowing up red, white, and green balloons with helium, and Vincent and Scott were decorating a large fake tree against the far wall dining room. They'd all stayed after work to decorate, and with Christmas carols blaring from a stereo someone had set on the stage, everyone was in the Christmas spirit. Even Vincent seemed a little less grumpy and distant than usual. Chica thought she might have even seen him smile a couple of times.

But unfortunately, she and Goldie were stuck outside.

Goldie shivered in his thin yellow tuxedo jacket as he stared longingly through the window. "Why did we have to get stuck with this job?"

Chica nodded, lifting a box with her numb hands. "I know. The only two animatronics who can feel cold get sent outside in the freezing snow to decorate. Perfect."

 _To be fair,_ Amber's voice butted in, _they don't know you can feel._

Goldie rolled his eyes. "Like that makes it any more enjoyable."

During the weeks since Halloween, Chica had helped Goldie deal with the voices and the new dreams. He seemed to get used to it pretty quickly, and Chica and Goldie found out that they could also talk each other how the voices talked to them. They could be standing across from each other in a room full of people and hear each other in their heads as clear as day. It wasn't a very useful skill, as they could do that by emailing or calling the other with their smartphone-like software, but it was a much quicker and a lot more reliable.

Chica held the box out to Goldie. "I think this is the last of it."

Goldie reached into the box and pulled out a string of LED lights. Chica set down the empty box. She grabbed the end of the coil, slipped a roll of tape off her arm, and taped the lights to the wall. Goldie held the lights around the doorframe while Chica went around, taping them to the wall. Goldie got to the end of the coil and opened a case in the wall, revealing a power outlet. He plugged in the lights, and they lit up in a bunch of different colours.

Chica stepped back. She would love to admire her handiwork, but she was freezing and wanted to get inside as soon as possible.

 _It looks nice though,_ Yellow Green observed.

 _Can't we stay out here a little bit longer?_ Blue whined.

"With all due respect," Chica sighed, "you're not the ones freezing their butts off in -30 weather." She picked up the empty box and pushed open the doors, letting Goldie in before she closed them.

She tossed the box onto a pile of other empty boxes and sat down at one of the tables, trying not to shiver from the lingering cold. She looked up at all her friends and decided that, despite the cold weather, she really liked Christmastime. Everyone was joking and laughing, no matter how much they usually hated each other. Bonnie was helping Tonnie and Mangle hang paper snowflakes from the ceiling, Foxy was chatting with Freddy as he helped him and Spring set up the tables, and Teddy was carrying a bunch of wrapping paper over to Mari and BB in the Prize Corner. Mike, Jeremy, Raina, and Tia had just finished decorating the party rooms and were now hanging coloured baubles on the tree with Vincent and Scott.

Chica felt a smile spread across her face. She couldn't wait until Christmas Day.

 ** _xXx_**

 ***Christmas***

Fritz was surprised when Vincent let him and Scott have the night off.

"You guys deserve it," he'd said the day before. "Besides, it's Christmas. You shouldn't have to work during the holidays. I'll take the night shift tomorrow. Heck, I'll take it tonight too. You guys just go home."

Apparently, he'd let all the guards on the day shift off work too, because the pizzeria wasn't even open that day. Fritz didn't have much family to visit, and the relatives he did have were all back in Canada, so he'd decided to visit the animatronics for Christmas. He had made them, so technically he was their dad, which made them family (sort of).

He pulled up to the animatronics house in his dark red car and saw Zoe's pickup truck in the driveway. What was she doing here? Didn't she have family to visit?

He popped open the trunk of his car and grabbed twelve wrapped up boxes. It was difficult, carrying them all to the house, but some of them were small, which made it easier. At least they weren't all big presents. That would have made it much harder.

Fritz had some difficulty opening the door, but after a couple of tries he was able to turn the knob and push it open. "MERRY CHRISTMAS!" he yelled as he entered the living room.

"HEY FRITZ!" a chorus of fourteen voices greeted him. He set the presents down on the floor next to where Chica and Goldie were sitting cross-legged, sipping hot chocolate. He didn't know why they even bothered drinking anything. It's not like they could taste it anyway. He didn't comment on it however, and instead shucked off his coat and tuque. "So how's everybody's first Christmas going?"

"Mom got me a yo-yo!" BB shouted excitedly, showing off his new toy. It dangled uselessly from his hand; he obviously hadn't gotten the hang of it yet.

He looked up at Zoe and Raina, who were both curled up together on the couch in a blanket. "Merry Christmas, Fritz," Raina said. "Come join us. We've got hot chocolate." She nodded at a pitcher of hot water, some empty mugs, and some packets of chocolate powder on the coffee table.

Since there was no room on the couch, Fritz sat down on the floor in between Mari and Mangle. "So, what did Zoe get you guys?" he asked the animatronics, filling up a mug with hot water and grabbing a couple packets of chocolate powder.

"I got a kite for when it's springtime again," Chica said, pointing to an open box next to the TV.

"I got a toboggan!" Tia piped up. She was currently sitting on her gift next to the couch.

Freddy held up a novel from where he sat next to Zoe on the couch. "Goldie, Mari, and I each got books. I got these ones called Harry Potter, Goldie got The Hunger Games, and Mari got a bunch of Chinese comics."

"They're Japanese," Mari corrected, "but they're printed in English, and they're called 'manga'. Uncle Jeremy told me about it, and it sounded interesting, so I wanted to try reading them."

"Cool," Fritz commented. He looked to his left at Mangle and Tonnie. "What about you two?"

"We got colouring books and crayons," Tonnie answered, holding up his present. The colouring book was open to a picture of a rabbit. It was coloured bright blue with green eyes, like his own. He had failed to stay within the lines of the picture, but he looked quite proud of his work.

"Mom couldn't afford to get me, Bonnie, and Foxy anything," Teddy said, "but Auntie Raina got us an Xbox."

"Of course, Foxy can't hold a controller," Bonnie mused, looking at Foxy's hook.

Zoe shrugged under her blanket. "I'll build him a detachable hand sometime."

"What did you get, Spring?" Fritz asked, turning to Springtrap, who was sitting on the couch next to Raina and busily scribbling in a sketchbook with coloured pencils. She absently held up the sketchbook and went back to drawing.

Fritz nodded. "Nice. So, how's your first Christmas been?" He looked around the room, directing the question at all the animatronics.

"I really like these books," Goldie said, picking one of them off the floor. "And the hot chocolate is great."

"You can't even taste it," Foxy scoffed.

Goldie blinked, confused. Then he inhaled sharply. "Ah, right. That isn't a thing I can do, obviously, because I'm an animatronic."

Chica shot him a glance. "It's still kinda useful though. Like, if you're having a conversation with someone and you're not sure how to reply, you can just take a drink to give a few more seconds to think of something to say. It's kinda handy."

BB's voice suddenly piped up. "Hey guys, look!"

Fritz turned towards him. BB flicked his wrist, and his new yo-yo whipped out, the string wrapping itself around BB's opposite finger, the yo-yo landing perfectly on the taut string, still spinning. He looked up at the others proudly.

Fritz applauded politely. "Nice."

"How'd you do that?" Mari asked, gazing at the toy in wonder.

"I Googled it," BB replied, twirling the yo-yo back into its original position.

"I used to have a yo-yo when I was younger," Raina said. "I could never really get the hang of it though."

"Hey, who wants to go outside?" Tia called out. She was standing by the door, her new toboggan tucked under one arm. Mangle and Tonnie immediately dropped their colouring books and excitedly followed Tia into the snow. BB forgot all about his yo-yo and rushed after them.

Fritz smiled as he watched the animatronics run outside and play in the snow. For once, he wasn't thinking about Vincent's odd behaviour or his and Zoe's plans at all.

 **IGNORE THE CRAPPY CHAPTER ENDING**

 **HAVE A MERRY CHRISTMAS**

 **OR A HAPPY HANUKAH**

 **OR WHATEVER YOU DO OR DON'T CELEBRATE**

 **K BYE**


	33. Chapter 33

**I watched Fantastic Beasts and now I want to be Newt Scamander for Halloween next year**

 **my friend even said she might get me a blue trench coat and a suitcase for my birthday in April**

 **also I'm gonna try starting up the shout outs again for the new year b/c I wanna interact with you guys and idk I'm too shy to go to your guys' pms**

 **ShoutOuts: DiverK9 (thanks :D ).**

 **Chapter 33**

Zoe tugged on her purple uniform, frustrated. She and Fritz had been planning to go through Vincent's room before Christmas, but then he'd been put back on the night shift for the few days before the holidays. That was annoying, but the real reason for her frustration was the fact that she hadn't been able to work much at her auto body for the past couple of months because of her new job. Sure, she liked working at the pizzeria, but it did get a boring after a while. She was thinking of asking for a couple days off so she could spend a bit more time at her other job. And between her work at the pizzeria and her and Fritz's plans, she hadn't been able to spend much time with Raina, either, so that was doubly annoying.

She heaved a great sigh and walked out the door, locking it behind her. She climbed into her pickup truck and sped off to the pizzeria. Fritz was already there, waiting for her. He'd been given a couple more days to work on the animatronics' programming, so hopefully they could get this done today.

 _ **xXx**_

 ***10 a.m.***

Fritz looked up as Zoe entered Parts and Service. "You ready?" Zoe shrugged. He closed his laptop and stood up. "I was thinking that maybe one of us could keep watch. You know, just in case Vincent shows up and decides to go in his room."

Zoe nodded. "Yeah. I'll do it. If he does come by, I can distract him long enough for you to get out."

"So what should I be looking for anyway?" Fritz asked. "We never really went over that."

Zoe shrugged again. "I don't know. Anything that looks suspicious, I guess. If you can find a journal or diary of some kind, that would be great."

He took a deep breath as the two of them walked out of the Parts and Service room. "Okay. Let's do this."

Zoe turned and walked away, positioning herself at the end of the hallway where she usually stood during her shift. Fritz put a hand on the door, but he was hesitant. What would he do if he was caught? What if he couldn't find anything and he and Zoe were doing this for no reason?

He pushed the doubts from his mind. If he and Zoe were right about Vincent being a murderer, they had to do this. They had to find proof.

Fritz opened the door slowly, glancing inside to make sure no one was there before slipping through into the room. The place was really messy. Clothes poured from the closet and the half open drawers of the dresser next to the unmade bed. A mirror and a sink were next to the closet in the far wall. There was a door next to the sink, but when he tried to open it, it turned out to be locked.

He looked around the room, wondering where to start. Zoe said that looking for a journal or diary would be a good idea. Fritz remembered keeping a diary when he was thirteen, and his sister would always try to read it, so he had to hide it in a different place every day. He began searching in the places he used to hide his own journal in his own room- in the closet, in the drawer of the nightstand, and under the dresser. He didn't find anything but dirty clothes, a pack of cigarettes, and a toaster.

Fritz was beginning to lose hope when he realized that he hadn't yet checked under the bed. He stepped out of the pile of clothes he was currently standing in and walked over to it, crouching down to look under it. There wasn't much to be seen under there- just an ashtray, more clothes, some bits of scrap metal, and some dirty plates.

Wait- scrap metal?

He excitedly reached under the bed and pulled out a piece, then sat back up to examine it. It was caked in dirt, but he scraped some of it away and saw that the metal was a dull gunmetal grey.

Why would Vincent have metal under his bed?

Fritz stood up with the metal in his hand and took a step towards the door, but he felt something under his shoe. He lifted up his foot to see what he just stepped on. It was a little yellow stuffed animal with a purple hat and bow tie. It looked like one of the Golden Freddy plushies they started making for the kids (along with ones that looked like the other animatronics; the Foxy ones unsurprisingly sold the most), but this one looked older. It's fur had faded to a pale yellow, and the purple hat was now dark with filth. Fritz assumed that it was one of the ones the original pizzeria used to sell in 1983. But why would a twenty-five year old man have a stuffed animal?

A sound suddenly emitted from the closet. "We're awake~," it sang in a feminine voice.

"Someone is in here," another voice that sounded similar to the other chuckled. Another one gave a high-pitched giggle from under the dresser. Music came from the nightstand, and the drawer began inching outward.

Fritz dropped the piece of metal and ran out of the room.

 ** _xXx_**

Springtrap sat down at a table clutching her sketchbook. She usually drew during the 3 o'clock break, but this time, she was hesitant. She wasn't just drawing nice animatronics anymore.

She glanced around. No one was looking. Mangle was hanging from the ceiling like usual, with Tonnie sitting on the stage and eating cookies. Chica and Goldie were talking in the Prize Corner, and Bonnie, Teddy, and Foxy were goofing off in Pirate's Cove. Freddy was reading one of his books in the corner. The guards had all left and were going for a walk together- including Vincent and Scott, which was a little surprising, but she didn't bother thinking about it.

She opened up her sketchbook to the previous page she drew on. On it was another one of her drawings, but this one was quite- unsettling, to say the least. It was a picture of a really dark room. There were bits of metal everywhere, the remnants of destroyed animatronics. She saw the broken body of the ballerina she drew a few weeks ago before the break, and there were also pieces of pink and white metal there too, which had to be the broken bits of the pink and white fox and bear she drew on Christmas. It was shaded to appear that she was looking through a window into the room. Inside the room, beside the window she was looking through, there was a machine that looked very similar to a giant ice-cream scooper. Facing the giant scooper was a man in a purple uniform. On his face was an expression of terror and pain. Soaking the front of the man's uniform was bright red blood. She could see her shadow on the floor through the window, and she appeared to be much taller. She didn't have any hair from what she could see, but it did look like she was wearing a party hat. The man had a nametag on his uniform. She tried to read it multiple times, but all she could make out was an "M" and an "I". The rest was covered by blood.

Spring closed her sketchbook, troubled. It wasn't so much the picture that was concerning.

What worried her the most was that she couldn't even remember drawing it.


	34. Chapter 34

**ShoutOuts:** **Scarlet Firesong (maybe you'll find out something else about william afton in this chapter who knows?)**

 **Chapter 34**

 ***Five days later, 1:06 a.m.***

Fritz had been on the night shift for an hour already, and this was usually when he'd have a quick nap, but he was wide awake. He hadn't been able to sleep the nights earlier either, because he kept thinking about those voices he heard in Vincent's room. He'd told Zoe about them, and offered to check out his room again the next day. She never got the chance, though, because Vincent decided to give her a few days off to focus on her auto body. She had accepted the offer and hadn't been at the pizzeria for the past couple of days. Fritz suspected that Vincent knew what Zoe and Fritz were doing. It was no coincidence that Vincent had given her days off the day after Fritz went through his room.

Fritz absently flipped through the cameras, his mind racing. Suddenly, he heard a loud _bang_ from the hall. He started and almost fell out of his chair, quickly snatching his flashlight off the desk. He turned it on and pointed it at the long corridor in front of him. There was nothing there. He sighed in relief and shut it off. He must have been imagining it.

 _BANG._

Fritz jumped and actually did fall out of his chair. He grabbed the edge of the desk and pulled himself back up, his heart pounding. This definitely wasn't his imagination. He grabbed the flashlight again and tried to press the button. His hands were shaking so much, it took him four tries to turn it on. He aimed it down the hallway. Nothing there.

 _BANG!_

The door to Vincent's room suddenly crashed open, and Vincent tumbled out into the hallway. He bumped into the wall opposite his room and shook his head, obviously disoriented. He looked up at Fritz, but his eyes were closed. _He's sleepwalking,_ Fritz thought. He remembered what Scott had said a few weeks earlier: " _As long as you don't move or speak, he'll ignore you and just wander away."_

Fritz immediately flicked off the flashlight, leaving the corridor in total darkness. He didn't dare move. He kept thinking back to what Scott had said that night; _"When he sleepwalks, he can also get a little- violent." "You'd survive, probably."_

He heard footsteps down the hall and tensed up nervously, but then he realized that they were getting quieter, moving away from him instead of towards. He was relieved, but then he suddenly realized that Scott was still in the dining room.

And Vincent was going straight towards him.

 ** _xXx_**

Scott walked out of the kitchen, flashlight in hand. He'd heard the loud crashing sounds and immediately dropped what he was doing to investigate. He shone his flashlight around the living room, but everything seemed to be normal. He glanced behind the counter in the Prize corner and checked in Pirate's Cove. Nothing was wrong there, so he started making his way to the hallway.

Unfortunately, he never got there.

He heard a footstep from the hall and cursed under his breath. He should have figured that it was him before. No one would be insane enough to break into Freddy Fazbear's at night, and Fritz never left the office, so it wouldn't be him.

Scott took a deep breath and turned off his flashlight. He could still kind of see because of the faint light from the security office down the hall. He stayed completely still and quiet. He wouldn't take action until he figured out which one this was...

"Is someone there?"

He almost sighed with relief, but figured that would be a bad idea. This one had impeccable hearing. If he wanted to get her back into the room, he'd have to be quiet.

He switched on his flashlight. She couldn't see anyway, but he needed to be able to see her. A slim figure clad in purple pyjamas was tiptoeing around the tables, barely making a sound with every step. "I can hear someone creeping through my room," it said, its voice deep and feminine.

Scott rolled his eyes. She said the same things every single time. Didn't she have any originality?

He quickly shucked off his shoes so his footsteps wouldn't make as much noise. He crept around, keeping the beam of the flashlight on the violet figure. He was close to her now. If he could just-

 _Snap._

He inhaled sharply and lifted his foot off the crayon he just broke. She whirled around to face him. Her eyes were now wide open and glowing bright purple. She screeched in rage and lunged at him, fangs bared. Scott yelped and dodged her grasp. She turned sharply and swung at him with her fist, which was her first mistake. He grabbed her wrist, and it was a simple matter of using her own forward momentum to pull her off-balance. She fell to the floor and twisted around so she was on her back. She started to push herself back up, but Scott planted a foot on her chest. She snapped her fangs and clawed at his leg, but he held his ground. So did she, however, and it was obvious that she wouldn't be going away anytime soon.

"Vincent." He pressed harder on her chest. "Listen to me. You need to go back to your room."

She snarled and lashed at him, her eyes blazing a fierce purple.

He sighed. "You know, for a ballerina, you're really violent." He glanced up at the cameras surrounding the dining room. None of them were on, so hopefully Fritz wouldn't be able to hear.

Scott grabbed her flailing arms (with great difficulty) and knelt down. "William. Can you hear me?"

She gnashed her teeth and growled, but she seemed to be struggling less. Good. She was getting tired.

"Come on, William," Scott whispered. "This is your body, not hers. You can get rid of her. Come back to me, buddy."

The glow in her eyes faded, and her arms went limp. Her metal fangs retracted and a set of human-looking teeth replaced them. She closed her eyes. Scott heard the quiet whirr of machinery as a pair of normal-looking blue eyes took their place. Scott let go and stood up. "You okay?" he asked.

Vincent opened his eyes and sat up. He looked around, confused. "What the-?" Then his eyes widened in realization, and he groaned. "I did it again, didn't I?"

Scott nodded and rubbed at the bruises on his leg. "Yeah. You did."

Vincent grabbed the edge of a table and pulled himself to his feet. "Which one?"

"The ballerina," Scott answered, bending over to pick up his shoes. He heard a crash and whirled around, afraid that she might be back. But it was just Vincent, who had started towards the hallway and tripped over a bunch of chairs on the way.

Scott chuckled and shook his head as he helped Vincent to his feet. Vincent saw the amused look on his face and glared at him. "Not a word," he commanded.

Scott shook his head. "Whatever." His smile turned into a grimace as he helped Vincent walk to his room. "I think I popped my back."

Now it was Vincent's turn to smile. "Glad I'm not as old as you."

Scott raised an eyebrow. "You shut up. You're older than I am!"

Vincent smirked. "Nope. I'm twenty-five year old Vincent Graves. _You're_ an old geezer with back problems."

Despite the insults, Scott snickered. "Yeah. Right." They rounded the hallway corner and Scott let go of Vincent's elbow. "You go back to sleep. I'll go make sure Fritz is alright." He started walking towards the office, then paused. "And lock the door," he added as an afterthought.

Vincent nodded and shut the door to his room.


	35. Chapter 35

**happy new year**

 **here's hoping that 2017 doesn't end up being a fuckin hell hole**

 **ShoutOuts: antoniodjones123 (thANK U)**

 **Chapter 35**

Zoe walked into the pizzeria a few days later, feeling satisfied. She'd gotten a short break from the pizzeria, and she was ready to get back to being a security guard.

But there was one thing she needed to do before she could get back to her job.

She looked around the dining room. Scott and Vincent were both helping Mari and BB organize the prizes in the Prize Corner. Foxy, Bonnie, and Teddy were sitting on a table and talking, which blocked Vincent and Scott's view to the hall. The rest of the animatronics were milling about, talking and getting ready for the work day. Unless Vincent suddenly decided that he had to visit his room, there was no way he'd know that Zoe was in there.

She made her way towards the hall, greeting some of the animatronics as she passed. She walked down the corridor, glancing back to make sure no one was following. She quickly reached the door to Vincent's room and was about to open the door when she heard voices from the far end of the hall. She startled and ducked into Party Room 3. The voices continued their conversation, unalarmed. So whoever they were hadn't seen her. Good.

She peeked out of the party room and looked down the hall at the security office. Two people clad in yellow were sitting on the desk, both facing the far wall and talking. She immediately recognized them as Chica and Goldie. Why were they talking back here?

"They're actually starting to open up to me," Goldie was saying. "Either they're beginning to trust me, or they're just helping me regain my memories out of pity. Whatever the reason, I'm not complaining."

Zoe furrowed her eyebrows. Memories? What memories? And who was he talking about?

Before she could dwell too much on this, Chica interrupted her thoughts. "Knowing them, it's probably pity. I don't know if they trust anyone. Even me."

Zoe got the feeling she wasn't supposed to be hearing this. She tiptoed out of the party room and quietly pushed the door to Vincent's room open. She wouldn't bother trying to figure out what they were talking about right now. Focus on one thing at a time.

Once she was in the room, she thought back to what Fritz had told her about the voices he heard when he was in here. He said they were coming from under the dresser, in the closet, and from the nightstand. Since the dresser was closest, she decided to start there. She crouched down and looked under it. There were pieces of scrap metal and dirty clothes scattered across the carpet, just like he had described. She also found it suspicious that there was metal in his room, but she was here for the voices, not for the metal.

"Hello?" she whisper-called. "Is anyone in here?" She paused, waiting for a response. When no one replied, she tried again. "Hello? Are you in here?"

Zoe waited a few seconds and was about to give up when she heard a giggle from the closet. "There's someone in the room," a feminine voice sang. Something else chuckled from under the dresser, and the drawer of the nightstand scooted open.

Zoe stood up. She was scared, but she couldn't leave now. If she could see what these were, then she and Fritz would be one step closer to finding out what Vincent was up to.

The nightstand drawer stopped, and something poked out of the opening. Zoe took a step towards it, and something suddenly pulled itself over the edge and tumbled out. She cautiously walked over to it. It was thrashing about on the floor, tangled in a towel, and she couldn't see it very well through the mess of fabric. She hesitantly reached out. It jerked violently and she withdrew her hand. Then she quickly grabbed the towel and ripped it away.

The thing that fell out of the drawer was not one thing, but four small things. They were peach-coloured humanoid figures. Their heads and feet might have once been white, but were now a dusty grey. Each one was wearing a ripped up grey tutu. One of them pushed itself to its feet and looked up at Zoe. Its yellow eyes whirred as it focused on her.

The closet doors slowly scraped open. Two more things waddled out. They were also peach-coloured and humanoid as well, but these were bigger and resembled babies. Both of them were caked in dust and the metal on them was dotted with holes, but their eyes were bright blue and undamaged. "Hello out there~" one sang in the same feminine voice as before.

Something else giggled from under the dresser. Zoe whirled around to see a small blue bunny animatronic crawling across the floor towards her. It reminded her of the original Toy Bonnie animatronic, but this one was torn up and damaged beyond repair.

Zoe stumbled backwards and tripped over a pile of clothes. Her ankle twisted in the same place it had broken once when she was twelve and left it permanently damaged. She tried to get up, but her foot throbbed with pain, and she fell back down. She was filled with fear as the little animatronics advanced on her. Here she was again, alone and afraid, unable to get away. She couldn't help but think back to that day when she was twelve. She was in the same situation now as she was back then, but this time, she might actually die. She tried to move, to crawl away, to do something, but fear overtook her and froze her in place. She was helpless.

 _"Hey."_

Zoe was snapped out of her frozen state and looked up. Vincent was standing in the doorway, his left sleeve soaked with blood. He was glaring, but not at her.

"Get back to your places, shitheads," he ordered the animatronics. "Don't make me ask twice."

The babies and the bunny giggled, but didn't move. One of the ballerinas shot across the floor and lunged at him, but he swiftly scooped it up and tossed it into the nightstand drawer. The rest of them glanced at each other and scuttled back into their respective places.

Vincent sighed. "I wish they'd listen to me better. Anyway," he turned to Zoe, "could you get out please?"

Zoe blinked. "You're- you're not mad?"

He shrugged as he walked over to the sink next to the closet. "Nah. Just a bit annoyed that you came in here without my permission." Then he raised an eyebrow and looked at her. "But I'm guessing you're not the only one who's come in here without asking."

Zoe sighed. "You know?"

"Of course I do," he said, rinsing the blood off his arm. "Those little fuckers tell me everything." He pointed to the closet, where the two baby animatronics had hidden.

She grabbed the edge of the dresser and pulled herself up so she was standing on her good foot. "But why would they tell you stuff? No offense, but they don't seem to like you very much."

He snorted. "And the feeling is mutual. But it's not me they're talking to. It's-" He hesitated. "Someone else."

Zoe raised an eyebrow. He said they told him everything, but then he said they weren't talking to him. That made no sense. Unless-

"Do you have multiple personalities?"

Vincent shook his head as he wrapped bandgaes around his injured arm. "No. Not exactly. Good guess though."

"Why do you even have those things in here anyway?" she asked. She wobbled on her one foot and grabbed the dresser again for support.

"I'm trying to fix them. An old friend of mine fucked them up really badly, and I've been trying for a long time to make them normal again. That's what all the metal is for," he said, gesturing to the floor. "Why are you asking so many questions?"

"Why are you answering them?" she fired back.

He shrugged. "Touche, Nova. But I can't answer all of them."

"Why not?"

"Like that one, for example." He pinned the bandages in place and rolled his bloody sleeve back down. "Look, I would love to tell both you and Fritz what's going on, but they won't let me."

"Who's they?"

He sighed. "Like I said, I can't tell you. Sorry."

Zoe was getting frustrated. Everything he said just raised more and more questions. She wasn't getting anywhere with this. "But- but isn't there anything you can tell me?"

He shook his head as he walked towards the door. "As far as I know, no."

She hopped along the dresser, following him. "What about where you got those scars?"

He winced. "Even I don't want to talk about that."

She got to the edge of the dresser and let go, trying not to fall over as she bounced along behind him. "What if I guess? Can I do that?"

Vincent snorted. "You can try." He walked out of the room, Zoe following. She waited and leaned against the wall as he closed the door.

She thought while they made their way down the hall to the dining room. "Car accident?"

"Nope."

"A bunch of feral cats attacked you in an alleyway?"

"Definitely not."

"Hmmm..." She thought back to the conversation they had when she first started working there. "You said it was from an accident, but you also said that Scott saved your life. So maybe... Attempted murder?" he said nothing, and her spirits lifted. "Is that it? Did I get it? Someone tried to kill you?"

He sighed. "I actually can't say for sure. I only remember pieces of what happened. But there is something I can tell you."

"What is it?" she asked eagerly.

"You need to stay away from Scott and me." Vincent turned back to look at her. "You and Fritz are asking too many questions, and they'll see that as a threat. You're also adults, which makes it worse." He shrugged. "Sorry, Nova. But as annoying as you and Fritz are, I'd rather not see either of you dead." He turned again and walked into the dining room.

Zoe's hope deflated. If they couldn't get information from Scott or Vincent, who would they get it from? And how?

 **sry fr the shitty chpter i had to go to school today and im tiRED as FUCK**


	36. Chapter 36

**sry i would have updated earlier but i rewatched the entire first season of tokyo ghoul and then i was sad and didn't want to write**

 **kAnEKI DId nOTHinG WRonG whY MusT hE SufFEr**

 **ShoutOuts: none :(**

 **Chapter 35**

Scott walked into the pizzeria the next morning, exhausted. Vincent had given him last night off to relax after what happened two nights ago, and he was grateful. But then he'd gotten the news, and he had to go to the restaurant to tell Vincent.

"Hi, Scott!" Jeremy waved at him from where he sat at one of the tables.

Mike looked up from his phone. "Sup?"

Scott gave them a nod of acknowledgement and glanced around the room. "Does anyone know where Vincent is?"

Jeremy shrugged. "Dunno. Probably his room."

"I'll come with you." Mike pocketed his phone and stood up.

Scott nodded. "Good idea. You should probably hear this too."

Jeremy began to get up from his seat. "Um, should I...?"

Scott shook his head and waved him back down. "No, it's fine. Besides, I want you to call Zoe and tell her Vincent's giving her every second day off, so she doesn't have to come to work today."

Jeremy nodded and pulled out his phone. "Okay. What about Raina?"

"Yeah, but we need her here today since Zoe's not going to be here," Scott said, only half listening. He was already making his way down the hall with Mike.

"Hey guys." Vincent glanced up from the book he was reading when the two guards entered. "What's up?"

"I have some bad news," Scott said, sitting on the edge of the bed. Mike sat next to him and looked at him expectantly.

Vincent raised an eyebrow as he closed his book. "What is it?"

Scott took a deep breath. "Mom called last night. Dad had a heart attack yesterday."

They were all quiet for a moment. Then Mike broke the silence. "Is he dead?"

Scott nodded. "Yeah. The funeral is in a week. I'm leaving after work today." He looked back at Vincent. "You know you can't come."

Vincent nodded and wiped at his eyes. "Yeah. I know," he said, his voice hoarse. "Mike should go, though. I'll get someone else to cover your shifts."

"I only met him a few times," Mike sighed, "but he was a nice guy."

"I wish I'd taken you to see him more when you were little," Scott said.

Something giggled from in the closet. Vincent picked a shoe up off his floor and whipped it towards the noise. "Shut up already!"

Scott reached out and put a hand on his shoulder. "William-"

Vincent shrugged his hand away. "I told you to stop calling me that when there are other people around."

Mike rolled his eyes. "Jeremy's in the dining room. It's not like he'd be able to hear you."

Vincent turned and looked at him. "You know I'm not talking about Jeremy."

Mike sighed. "I know."

The drawer of the nightstand started to wiggle open, and Vincent grabbed it and slammed it shut. "Leave me alone, dammit!"

A smile tugged at the corners of Mike's mouth. "Well, looks like you gave them a _pizza_ your mind."

Scott and Vincent both turned around and looked at him. The closet opened and the two baby animatronics poked their heads out to stare at him. The nightstand drawer scootched open and four little ballerina robots stuck their heads out to stare as well.

"I am so tempted to fire you right now," Vincent stated.

Something giggled from under the dresser, and Mike pointed at it. "See? Bonbon thinks I'm funny! You guys just have no sense of humour!"

"Is he making bad puns again?"

All three of them jumped in surprise when Jeremy appeared in the doorway. The nightstand drawer and closet doors snapped shut, but luckily, Jeremy didn't seem to find this suspicious. Scott glanced at Vincent. He was glad that he covered up his scars as soon as he woke up, or Jeremy would have seen them. Zoe and Fritz were already suspicious of him, and he didn't need Jeremy on his case, too.

Vincent laughed nervously. "Yeah. Um, did you call Zoe and Raina?"

Jeremy shrugged. "I didn't even need to call them. They both stopped by to drop off the animatronics. I just told Zoe to go back home." He glanced at his watch. "Anyway, it's nine forty-five, and we have a birthday party in fifteen minutes."

Vincent tensed. "Shit! I'm not dressed yet!" He practically launched himself off the bed to the dresser.

"Well, I'm gonna go get things set up," Jeremy said. "Mike, wanna come? I could use some help, and Raina keeps getting distracted by the sparkly decorations."

As the two guards left, Scott crouched down and picked a dirty t-shirt off the floor. "Have you even washed your uniform?"

Vincent gestured around the room with one hand. "Do you see a washing machine anywhere around here?" He stopped rummaging through the drawers for a moment. "Are you sure I can't come to the funeral?"

Scott sighed and stood up, dropping the shirt on the floor. "The family wouldn't even recognize you, and they think you're dead. Besides, if the ballerina decides to show up, or either of the other two for that matter-"

"I don't even care at this point," Vincent grumbled, grabbing his rumpled uniform and tossing it on the bed. "I just don't want to live here anymore. I want to live in a normal house, and have a wife that doesn't leave for no reason, and have kids that don't end up dying, and have a friend that doesn't end up ruining my life." He sighed and sat down on the bed. "I wish I'd never even met him."

Scott nodded. "Me too. But there's nothing we can do about it now."

Vincent sighed again. "Go help the others. I'll be out in a minute."

Scott hesitated. Then he turned away and walked out of the room, closing the door behind him.

 ** _xXx_**

 ***That evening***

Zoe wiped the machine grease off her hands. It had been a busy day of changing tires and fixing car engines, and she was eager to have a nice, warm shower. She and Raina were going to go out and get dinner together because they hadn't been able to hang out as much ever since they started working at the pizzeria, and she still needed to clean herself up. She was just starting to take off her boots when she heard a knock at the door.

 _Shit, she's early!_ Zoe thought, immediately thinking it was Raina. _I'm not ready_! She quickly stood up and ran to the door. She opened it, an apology already escaping her lips. "I'm sorry, Raina, I thought-" She stopped when she realized that the person at the door wasn't Raina.

The girl standing there had long brown hair pulled back into a braid. Her brown eyes looked almost orange in the light of the sinking sun, and a bunch of little freckles were sprinkled across her nose and cheeks. She was quite short and wearing a simple outfit of jeans and a zipped up leather jacket. If it had been Raina wearing that outfit, the jeans would have been embroidered with multicoloured zigzags and swirls and the jacket would have been a bright bubblegum pink instead of a dark brown.

"Hello," Zoe greeted. "How can I help you?" She was surprised to see this person at her doorway at this time. Most people knew her auto body was closed by this time.

"Hi," the girl responded. "My car broke down a little ways into town. I already asked someone for help, but they didn't know what to do, so they sent me here. They said you were a good mechanic," the girl said. When Zoe didn't reply, she raised an eyebrow. "You are a mechanic, aren't you?"

Zoe shook herself out of her stupor and nodded. "Yeah. So, where's your car? I'll drive you there and see if I can do anything."

"Just that way." The girl pointed to her left, down the road. "I'm not sure what the street name is, but my car is bright blue. It would be hard to miss." She turned and walked down the steps to the driveway, where Zoe's truck sat.

Zoe pulled on a jacket and followed the girl to her truck. She gestured towards the passenger door. "Hop in." The girl opened the door and climbed into the truck, and Zoe got in the driver's seat. She pulled out of the driveway and sped down the street. The girl stayed silent for most of the ride, only speaking to give Zoe simple directions: "Go left." "I think it was down that way." "Go right, I think?"

It didn't take long to find the girl's vehicle. She had apparently been able to pull over before her car broke down, because it was sitting next to the sidewalk in front of someone's house.

Zoe pulled over and hopped out of the truck. The girl did the same and walked over to her car. "I don't even know what happened. I was just driving along, and then the engine started making weird noises. I pulled over and opened the hood to see what was wrong, but I couldn't figure it out."

Zoe followed the girl to the car and opened the hood. She looked over the engine and stepped back. "I think the only problem is that your car is pretty old, and it's cold as heck out here. Not really a good combination. Has your car ever been difficult to start in the winter?"

The girl shrugged. "A couple of times, yes, but only when it's really cold out."

Zoe reached into the large pockets of her tool belt and rummaged around. "I'll probably be able to fix it up a little so it runs better, but I'd have to bring it into my garage to repair it completely." She pulled out a couple of tools and set to work.

The girl leaned over Zoe's shoulder to watch. "How do you even do that?" she asked in awe as Zoe's hands flitted effortlessly across the parts of the engine, tweaking some things and fixing others.

Zoe shrugged. "Dunno. My grandma taught me a little when I was young. I learned a bit on my own, and I took a few classes in school. Now it's just kind of a sixth sense."

"Fascinating," the girl whispered. "The only things my hands are good for are giving students bad grades."

"You're a teacher?"

"Yeah. I came here for a job interview. Hopefully I'll be teaching eighth grade English by the end of the week."

Zoe smiled. "I was never really very good at English. Seriously, my spelling is atrocious." She paused. "I don't even know if I can spell 'atrocious'."

The girl laughed. "I'm Charlie, by the way. Charlie Brooks."

"Zoe Nova," Zoe said. "I'd shake your hand, but-" She raised one grease-covered arm.

Charlie smiled. "Yeah. I get it."

"So, Charlie, have you got an apartment anywhere? If I can't get your engine fixed, I might have to drive you home."

Zoe saw Charlie shake her head out of the corner of her eye. "No. I'm just going to stay in a motel until I have enough money to pay for a house."

Zoe looked up from her work. "You can stay with me for now, if you want. I've got a spare guest room you can stay in. Besides, I might need more time to work on your car."

Charlie thought about it for a moment, then nodded. "Okay. No use in wasting money on a gritty motel if someone's offering to let you stay with them."

Zoe nodded. "Exactly." She shoved her tools back into her belt and slammed the hood of the car down. "Well, I think that's as good as it's going to get for now. Why don't we head back to my house? I'm going to get dinner with a friend, and I don't want to be late." She looked up at Charlie as she wiped her hands on her coveralls. "You can tag along if you want."

Charlie smiled. "Sure. I think I'd like that."

The two got into their separate vehicles and drove off.


	37. Chapter 37

**ShoutOuts: none (again)**

 **Chapter 37**

 ***The next morning***

Zoe woke up at 8:40 a.m. to the sound of her alarm clock. She didn't want to get up, but she had to work at the pizzeria today, so she rolled out of bed and stumbled to her closet where her clean uniform hung. She tugged it off its hanger and sluggishly pulled it on. By the time she was dressed, she was just awake enough to run a comb through her hair and put on her yellow tie. She went downstairs for breakfast, where Charlie was already sitting, sipping at a cup of coffee and reading the morning newspaper.

She looked at Zoe's groggy, tired expression and grinned. "Not a morning person, are you?"

Zoe smiled back and shook her head. "Nope. I just have to get up early because I have work." She grabbed a piece of bread and tossed it onto a plate. Even though they'd only met the day before, she was already starting to feel like she and Charlie were getting to be good friends.

Charlie took a swig of her coffee. "Really? I thought you were a mechanic," she stated, looking at Zoe's clean, grease/oil-free outfit.

Zoe opened a drawer and grabbed a butter knife. "Well, I am, but a few months ago, I got a job at a local restaurant. Maybe you saw it on our way back here. Freddy Fazbear's Pizza?"

She looked back at Charlie. Her coffee cup was frozen halfway to her mouth, and she was staring at the counter with a stunned look on her face.

"Freddy Fazbear's..." she whispered. She set down her coffee cup. All of a sudden, she giggled. "Man, what a coincidence! I was just about to ask if you could drive me there!"

Zoe raised an eyebrow as she started buttering her bread. "Seriously? Why would you want to go there? It's a kids' restaurant."

Charlie shrugged. "I used to live here as a kid. I came back ten or so years ago to get a job as a security guard at Fazbear's Fright, but then I left to go to university. Anyway, I used to know the owners, Scott and William. Do they still work there?"

"Well, I don't know any 'William', but Scott's still there. The new owner is this guy named Vincent. He's pretty bossy, and he gets angry a lot, but he's not so bad once you get to know him."

"Vincent..." Charlie thought for a moment, then seemed to understand something. "Oh. So that's what he- Oh."

Zoe took a bite of her bread and looked at her curiously. "What? What is it?"

Charlie shook her head. "Doesn't matter. Anyway, there was also a guy named Michael. I remember him because he had the same name as my brother. I think he was Scott's son. Is he still there?"

Zoe shrugged, still wondering about Charlie's reaction to the name Vincent. "No. But there is a guy named Mike. I doubt it's the same person, though, because I've met Mike's parents, and neither of them are named Scott."

Charlie nodded and sipped her coffee. "Hmm. Well, at least I'll be able to see Scott."

Zoe shook her head. "Actually, he and Mike left yesterday after work. Scott has a funeral to go to, and Mike's accompanying him. Dunno why Mike's going. He probably just feels bad for him."

"Oh well." Charlie finished off her coffee and stood up. "I'll get to see him some other time, when I permanently move in somewhere." She glanced at the clock on the wall. "When do you have to be there?"

"At nine," Zoe answered, finishing off the last of her bread. "I'd better go brush my tee-"

 _DING DONG_.

Zoe brushed the crumbs off her hands and walked over to the door. Who would be knocking at her door at 8:50 in the morning? She put a work schedule up on her door so people would know when she was available. They should know that she wasn't working today.

She opened the door and was about to tell the person that no, she was not working today, but stopped short when she saw Raina at the door.

"Hi Zoe!" Raina gave her a big smile. She was, as usual, wearing an outfit of her own creations. Bright blue leggings with olive-green knee-high boots, and a hot pink jacket with orange pockets.

Zoe couldn't help but smile back. "Hi, Raina. What brings you here?"

Raina's grin seemed to get even wider. "Well, I was just going to call you and ask, because it would be much easier, not to mention a lot faster, but I was going out to buy groceries anyway, so I figured I would just come here and ask you face to face." Her cheeks were blushing bright red, probably because of the brisk wind. "I was wondering if-" Then she stopped. Her smile wavered. "Oh. I... I didn't realize you had company."

Zoe turned around to see Charlie leaning against the counter, still skimming the newspaper. "Oh yeah. That's Charlie. You remember her, right?"

Raina nodded. "Yeah. She came to dinner with us. I didn't know she would be- ah- staying with you."

Zoe shrugged. The conversation suddenly felt really awkward. "Um, yeah. She doesn't have a place to stay yet, so I'm just letting her use the guest room. Plus her car needs a tune-up, so..." She gulped. "So, what was it you wanted to ask me?"

Raina glanced inside again, then shook her head. "Nevermind. It was nothing. Just- wondering if you- needed a ride to work. That's all."

Zoe shook her head. "No, I'm fine."

Raina nodded. "Okay. Bye, I guess." She turned and started back down the driveway to her car.

"I'll see you later," Zoe said hesitantly.

Raina didn't even look back. She got in her car and drove away, and Zoe wasn't even sure if she'd heard her through the whistling wind.

Zoe sighed and closed her door. She felt kinda sad, and she didn't know why.

Charlie glanced up from the newspaper. "Your face is all red."

"It is?" Zoe glanced at the mirror that hung just next to the door. Her cheeks were indeed blazing a bright pink. She shook her head. "Must be windburn."

Charlie raised an eyebrow. "You sure?"

Zoe shot her a glare. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Charlie shrugged and folded up the newspaper. "Nevermind. Should we head over to the pizzeria now? If your boss is as bad as you say he is, I don't think you want to be late."

 ** _xXx_**

Zoe and Charlie entered the pizzeria at 9:07. She was a few minutes late because of her encounter with Raina, but she didn't think Vincent would mind. The animatronics were already there, milling about and getting ready for work. Jeremy had probably gone to pick them up, or maybe they'd walked here on their own.

Jeremy glanced up from his phone and waved at Zoe. "Hey, Supernova! Who's your friend?" he asked, nodding at Charlie.

"Hey, Jerebear," Zoe said. "This is Charlie. Charlie, this is Jeremy, my friend."

"Hi," Charlie greeted him.

"She's staying at my place for now, until her car is fixed and she can get her own house," Zoe explained.

"Nice to meet you, Charlie." Jeremy said. He turned back to his phone and seemed to forget all about them.

Tia skipped up to them and beamed at Charlie. "Hi! I'm Tia! Welcome to Freddy Fazbear's! What's your name?"

Charlie smiled. "I'm Charlie. It's nice to meet you. Let me guess; you're the Toy Chica animatronic?"

"That's me!" Tia confirmed cheerfully. She began pointing out the different animatronics and telling Charlie their names. "The one eating cookies out of the jar is Tonnie, the Toy Bonnie animatronic, and that one above him on the ceiling is Mangle- you know, Toy Foxy- and the three that are spray-painting swear words on the walls are Foxy, Bonnie, and Toy Freddy, or Teddy as we like to call him, and those two ones in yellow who are sitting on the table and talking are my sister Chica and Goldie, and-"

As Tia introduced each of the robots to Charlie, who was listening very intently, Zoe took out her phone and tried to text Raina.

 _hey rainbow. i wanna talk. can you come over later?_

She sent the message and pocketed her phone. Tia was still rambling. "-and the one drawing in the corner over there is Springtrap, and the one reading manga and ranting to Freddy is the Marionette, whom we renamed Mari, and Balloon Boy is that one over there, playing with a yoyo, and-" She looked around the restaurant. "I think that's it. Of course, there are a couple more employees, but they're not here right now."

Charlie nodded. "I think I remember all of the original animatronics. Especially Springtrap." She looked uncertainly over at said animatronic, who was still huddled in the Prize Corner, clutching her sketchbook.

Tia giggled at Charlie's nervousness. "Don't worry. We don't kill people anymore."

"But I think Freddy's about to," Zoe commented, looking at the animatronic. He was glaring across the room at Teddy, Bonnie, and Foxy, whom had just finished spray-painting a variety of insults about Freddy on the wall beside the stage. Almost every single insult on the wall contained a swear.

Tia sighed. "I'd better go tell them to wash that off the wall before the kids get here." She sauntered over to the three boys. Charlie sat down at one of the tables to see how this would play out.

Zoe glanced down at her phone. Raina hadn't replied yet, which was weird, because she always answered her texts within three minutes.

"Whatcha doin'?"

Zoe turned around to see Vincent standing there, a cigarette held in between two fingers. He was looking at her curiously, one eyebrow raised.

Zoe sighed and shoved her phone back into her pocket. "I ran into Raina this morning, and she seemed upset. I'm trying to text her, but she's not answering."

"Ah. Trouble in paradise?"

Zoe looked at him. "What?"

He stared at her for second, then sighed and shook his head. "Nevermind." Then he caught sight of Charlie, who was sitting in a chair, watching Tia bicker back and forth with Teddy, Foxy, and Bonnie. "Who's that? If they're looking for a job, we can't afford any more employees."

Zoe shook her head. "Nope. She's already going to get a job. I think she used to work at a Fazbear franchise, though. Her name's Charlie."

Vincent's eyes flashed with recognition. "Charlie?"

Charlie stood up from her chair and turned around to say something to Zoe, but then she caught sight of Vincent. She furrowed her eyebrows. "William?"

Vincent shook his head, but he shot Zoe a look, like he was saying "pay attention to this". Zoe remembered what he said a couple days ago, when she was caught snooping through his room: "Look, I would love to tell both you and Fritz what's going on, but they won't let me." Maybe the "they" he was talking about then weren't present right now, or maybe he'd found a loophole in the restrictions "they" had put on him; whatever the case, she knew he wanted her to know what he was about to say, and that he wanted her to tell Fritz, too.

He held out his hand for Charlie to shake. "No, my name is not William. I'm Vincent, the new owner. But I think I knew William. He was _Scott's brother_ , wasn't he?"

Charlie reached out and shook his hand, looking at him curiously. She looked at Zoe, then at Vincent, then at the various animatronics wandering about, and she seemed to catch on to whatever Vincent was doing. "Oh, yeah. I remember that. Didn't Scott have a son? A boy named _Michael_?"

Vincent nodded and let go of her hand."Yes, but I think Michael _prefers to go by 'Mike_ ' now." They were emphasizing certain words, as though indirectly telling Zoe to pay special attention to those phrases.

Charlie nodded. "Ah. How old is he now? Do you know?"

"I'd say he's about forty years old, maybe older. Now, say, hypothetically, maybe _three of his childhood friends_ thought that he was younger, like, about their age-"

"Maybe thirty-two, thirty-three?"

"Exactly."

"But they're childhood friends. Wouldn't his friends know how old he was? Wouldn't they _remember_?"

"Well, I don't know. Maybe, hypothetically, their memories were tampered with."

"And, hypothetically, if such a thing were possible-"

"Which it most certainly isn't."

"No, of course not. But if it were, then do you think, hypothetically, maybe Michael- er, Mike, would know how that happened?"

"I'd say he would know. And I think that, hypothetically, if one of these three friends wanted to know, then they could just go ask him."

"Hypothetically."

"Of course." Vincent smiled at Charlie. "Well, it was wonderful meeting you, Charlie." He nodded at Zoe. "Thanks for bringing her here, Nova." He turned and walked away.

Charlie smiled at her. "Yeah. Thanks. It was nice being here again. Anyway, I should get going to my job interview." She winked at her, then walked out of the pizzeria.

Zoe pulled out her phone. Maybe Raina wasn't speaking to her, but there was one person she could talk to. Vincent and Charlie had just given her a lot more information, and Fritz had to know.


	38. Chapter 38

**ShoutOuts: antoniodjones123 (maybe), adn MagicMakerRose (how would pairing Zoe with Raina be ruining the story? If it's because they're two OCs, then I _definitely_ understand where you're coming from, and tbh, I might not even put them together at all. But if you don't mind, I just kind of want to know the reason you think their relationship would ruin the story.)**

 **Chapter 38**

Fritz stared at Zoe, a shocked look on his face. "That's unbelievable. And they told you all of this willingly?"

Zoe nodded. After work, she had rushed right over to Fritz's house to tell him everything Vincent and Charlie had said. It was around dinnertime, so she brought a couple boxes of pizza with her, figuring they could just eat together. His house was very neat and orderly, much unlike her own home, which was constantly littered with grease rags, chips bags, and dirty clothes. Fritz had just woken up from a nap when she arrived and had to make himself a cup of coffee to stay awake while she talked. But as she explained, he'd gotten more excited and surprised, and now his coffee sat forgotten and cold on the table.

"I mean, they didn't tell me directly," Zoe said, taking a piece of pizza from one of the boxes. "They kind of made it so it looked like they were having a conversation, but they definitely meant for me to hear it and tell you. They made that really obvious."

Fritz nodded. "Okay. But why didn't they just tell you outright?"

Zoe shrugged and took a bite of her pizza. "I don't know. Probably for the same reason Vincent couldn't tell me anything a few days ago. He said something about 'someone else'. Apparently, these people won't let him tell us anything. Why they didn't stop him from talking to Charlie, and why Charlie can't tell me anything, I don't know."

"But if we can talk to Mike, then maybe these people don't have anything over him," Fritz said. "We'll have to wait for him and Scott to get back."

Zoe nodded. "Yeah." She finished off the last of her pizza and wiped her hands on her shirt. "So, who else was on the night shift with you last night?"

"Vincent." Fritz shuddered. "I was terrified the whole time. I don't even know how he stayed awake for the entire shift, because he didn't sleep at all during the day. Another thing to add to my list of weird stuff about him."

"Yeah. Well, he said he'd get somebody to take over Scott's shift, if that makes you feel any better."

Fritz nodded and sipped at his cold coffee. "Yeah, it does. So, who'd he get?"

Zoe shrugged. "Don't know. Maybe he got Jeremy to do it, or maybe Charlie volunteered. Whoever it is, I'm sure you'll be fine."

"I sure hope so."

Zoe glanced at the clock and stood up. "Well, I should go. I want to see if Raina's okay. She hasn't spoken to me since this morning, and I kind of want to check on her."

Fritz nodded. "Alright. Well, thanks for coming over."

Zoe shrugged on her coat and knelt down to tie up her boots. "Thanks for having me." She walked out the door and pulled out her phone. She'd texted Raina multiple times throughout the day, hoping for an answer, but the only response she got was _cant talk busy rn_ , which was unusual for Raina. She always used proper grammar, capitalization, and punctuation, and _never_ abbreviations. There was definitely something wrong.

Zoe got in her truck and drove away.

 ** _xXx_**

 ***3 1/2 hours later***

Fritz arrived at the pizzeria, still a little tired. He hadn't gotten much more sleep after Zoe visited. He kept thinking about what she told him about Vincent and Scott and Mike. He was still lost in his thoughts, and didn't even notice the table he was about to walk into. Fortunately, someone pulled him away before he could crash into it. Fritz wasn't expecting this, so he instinctively yelped, pulled his arm out of the person's grasp, and elbowed them in the jaw. Luckily, the person couldn't even feel it, as they were animatronic, not a real person.

Springtrap rotated her jaw and it clicked back into place. "Gee, thanks for that, Dad," she said sarcastically. "You know, just because I can't feel doesn't mean you should go around hitting me in the face."

Fritz sighed in relief. "Oh, it's just you. Sorry about that, Spring. What are you doing here, anyway?"

Springtrap gestured to the purple uniform she was wearing. "I'm the fill-in security guard. Vincent needed someone to do it, so I volunteered."

"But you have work tomorrow," Fritz said. "You need to recharge!"

She shrugged. "I can sleep a bit before work, a bit after work, and during our 3 o'clock break. I'll be fine. Don't worry."

Fritz sighed. He thought of the animatronics as his kids, and he was tempted to be a good "dad" and tell her to go home and rest. But there was no one else there who could take her place aside from Vincent, and he needed his sleep too, so there were really no other options. "Alright. Whatever. So, do you know what to do?"

Spring nodded. "Yep. Vincent already explained everything."

Fritz nodded. "Well, okay. Good luck." He turned and walked down the hallway to the security guard room.

 ** _xXx_**

Minutes passed. Then hours. Fritz absently flipped through the cameras, taking extra care not to shine the flashlight directly at Springtrap. The few times he slipped up, though, she wasn't effected at all. For the first hour or so, Fritz was on edge, constantly glancing up at Vincent's door, keeping the camera on Spring at all times. Eventually, he calmed down, and it fell into the same boring routine he went through every night. he checked on Spring a couple of times on the cameras, and she seemed to be doing pretty well.

He heard a noise from the hall and glanced up, thinking it was just Springtrap coming down the hallway. But there was no one in the hallway. Fritz stared at Vincent's door. It had to be him again. There was no other explanation.

Fritz set the tablet down on the desk and turned off his flashlight. He was scared. If Vincent was sleepwalking again, Springtrap might not be able to control him, and Fritz definitely wouldn't be able to. They might be able to overpower him if they worked together, but it was still terrifying.

The door slowly swung open, and Fritz held his breath in fear. However, Vincent didn't come out of his room like he had last time. Instead, Fritz heard a familiar high-pitched feminine giggle. He couldn't see much down the hallway, but he could hear something scraping against the floor. A voice sang out from down the corridor. "Hello out there~"

Fritz furrowed his eyebrows. That definitely didn't sound like Vincent, nor did it sound like Springtrap, but it did bear a remarkable resemblance to the voice he heard from Vincent's closet a week or so ago.

He didn't know what to do. Was he supposed to stay still and quiet, like what he would do with Vincent, or was he supposed to try and get it back into the room?

The thing stepped into the dim light of the security office, and Fritz almost laughed. It was just a little baby-looking thing, chubby and pink. It had big, round, blue eyes that stared at him as it waddled into the room. It looked ridiculous.

Then he heard the whir of machinery, and realized that it was animatronic. Okay, that was slightly more concerning.

Then another one stumbled into the office. Now he was getting nervous.

"Is it the same person?" one of them asked.

"It can't be," the other one replied with the same voice. "Their hair is orange, not brown."

"And they're wearing glasses," the first one observed. "You're right."

It took Fritz a moment to realize thet they were talking about him. Now he was scared again. What were they doing?

Suddenly, something rushed out of Vincent's room and almost crashed into the opposite wall. Fritz yelped and nearly fell out of his chair ( _again_ ; he'd been doing that a lot lately). He looked up and saw that it was Vincent.

A wave of fear washed over Fritz for a moment, but then he saw that Vincent's eyes weren't closed, so he obviously wasn't sleepwalking. Vincent blinked, disoriented, then focused on Fritz. "Hi, Fritz,"he said, his voice shaking. "Um, just out of curiosity, have you seen any baby-looking robots around here? Maybe about a foot tall? Covered in dust?"

Fritz gulped. "Uh, yeah. They're right there." He pointed over the desk at the little animatronics.

Vincent looked down and jumped back in surprise. "Okay. That's not good. That's really not good. Okay. Oh, shit. Alright, Fritz, just stay there. Whatever you do, _don't move_. Just _don't_."

Fritz nodded slightly. "Okay. Not moving."

Vincent took a step towrds the office. When he spoke again, his voice didn't souond like his. It sounded like a little girl's. "Go back to your room, girls. Everything is fine."

The two babies looked at each other. "He's doing it again," one of them said, sounding rather exasperated.

"He may sound like her, but it's not her," the other said.

Vincent sighed. "That never works," he whispered in his normal voice. "It was pointless to even try."

"If I can't move, and you can't do whatever you were trying to do, then what do we do?" Fritz asked. "Let them attack me?"

Vincent shook his head. "I- I don't know. I have no idea. These two never get out. This has never happened before."

The two babies reached the desk and began tapping at it with their metal fingers. "This isn't the same desk," one of them observed.

The other robot's smile seemed to grow wider. "They have no where to hide now."

Fritz almost felt like crying. He wished he could hide.

Suddenly, one of them gasped. "She's watching us!"

The other one looked at her. "Are you sure?"

"Positive."

Vincent furrowed his eyebrows. "She? No. No, she can't be back. She can't be." His eyes widened. "My eyes." He stepped into the light of the office, a frantic, scared look on his face. "Fritz! What colour are my eyes?"

Fritz raised an eyebrow. Now he was more confused than terrified. "Um, blue, like they've always been. Vincent, what's going on?"

One of the babies grabbed the other one's arm. "We have to leave now! She's coming!" They ran past Vincent and back into the room. "We'll see you again soon~!" they sang as they disappeared through the door.

"What's going on back here?" a voice asked. Vincent and Fritz looked down the hallway to see Springtrap walking towards them, a flashlight in her hand.

Fritz looked back at the door to Vincent's room. It was closed now. He thought about what those two animatronics had said: _"She's watching us." "She's coming."_

"Vincent? What are you doing up?" Spring rushed forward. "You're supposed to be asleep."

Vincent glanced at Fritz, then back at Spring. "Ah, I was just- using the bathroom." He walked past her and back to his room. When he got inside, Fritz heard the click of a lock.

Spring walked into the office and put her flashlight back on her belt. "I heard a noise so I came down here. Is everything alright?"

Fritz looked back at Vincent's door. "Um, yeah. Everything's just great."


	39. Chapter 39

**ShoutOuts: MagicMakerRose (I might, just because I haven't done much with Raina, but idk I'm still deciding), and Guest (aww, thanks!)**

 **Chapter 39**

Zoe woke up at 9 a.m. a week later. She didn't have work at the pizzeria that day, so she was free to work at her auto body.

She grabbed her phone off her nightstand. No texts from Raina. She sighed. They hadn't spoken for a week now. Zoe was going to go over to her house and try to talk things out, but then she got a call from one of her frequent customers saying that their car had broken down. They had a _really_ old car and couldn't afford to buy a new one, or even get a tune-up or a new engine, so Zoe got a lot of calls from that person. By the time she had finished, it had been pretty late, so she decided to just go home.

Mike and Scott weren't back from the funeral yet. She'd called Mike yesterday, and he said that they would be back sometime today. That was good. Maybe talking to him would get her mind off Raina.

She dragged herself out of bed and stumbled to her closet.

 ** _xXx_**

 ***7 hours later***

It was almost the end of the work day, and Mike and Scott had just gotten back from the funeral. They decided to go to the pizzeria to see everyone instead of just going home.

"What's up, guys?" Mike yelled as soon as he and Scott walked through the doors.

"Hi guys," Raina said, shooting them a smile as she walked towards the door, carrying a bunch of pizza boxes. "How was the funeral?"

Mike shrugged. "Eh. It was just a typical funeral. Everyone was all dressed up, people were crying and making speeches." He paused. "Now that I think about it, it wasn't all that different from a wedding."

Raina laughed. "Yeah, I guess you're right." Her smile wavered. "Hey, um, are you going to go see Zoe later?"

Mike shrugged. "Maybe. I'm still going to see her tomorrow, anyway."

Raina nodded. "Okay. Well, Jeremy's in Party Room 3 if you want to go see him."

"Actually, we were going to ask where Vincent was," Scott interrupted. "We should probably let him know we're back."

"I think he's in the Prize Corner right now," Raina said. "He took over Mike's shift while you guys were gone."

"Thanks, Raina." Scott smiled. They left her at the door and walked over to the Prize Corner, greeting some of the animatronics as they passed.

Vincent was talking to an angry woman and a young teenager when they got to the Prize Corner. "Look, I'm sorry Miss, but your daughter doesn't have enough tickets for a Foxy plush. By all means, play more arcade games, but you can't get a plush right now. You're still ten tickets short-"

"But it's her birthday!" the woman yelled, putting her hand on her daughter's shoulder. "I thought you people dealt with birthday stuff!"

"Mom, it's okay," the teenage girl said. "I can just play some more games. It's fine. I really don't mind."

The lady ignored her daughter and continued shouting. "This is outrageous! Honestly, there's something wrong with you people!"

Vincent glanced around the restaurant and caught sight of Scott and Mike. He breathed a sigh of relief. "I'm sorry Miss, but I have to go."

The woman stared after him as he hurriedly walked over to the two guards. " _Excuse_ me? I'm talking to you! Hey!"

The girl put a hand on her mother's arm. "Come on, Mom. Let's go back to the arcade." The woman was still grumbling as her daughter dragged her across the pizzeria.

"Busy day, huh?" Scott said when Vincent reached them.

Vincent rolled his eyes. "You have no idea. I almost got in a fistfight with this one guy whose kid didn't win the scavenger hunt a couple days ago. He said he'd come back, but he hasn't yet." He sighed. "I wish I lived in Canada."

Scott nodded."Same. Anyway, we just decided to stop by and see if you were okay."

Vincent shrugged. "Yeah, I'm fine."

Mike raised an eyebrow. "You hesitated."

"No I didn't."

"Yes you did."

"No, I didn't."

"Actually, you did," Scott confirmed. "What's wrong?"

Vincent thought for a moment. "Um, do you guys remember Charlie?"

Mike shook his head. "No. I mean, I recognize the name, but not much else."

Scott put a hand on his shoulder. "I don't blame you. You were pretty little when you met her. She was Henry's daughter."

"She came back to the city for a job interview," Vincent said."She visited the pizzeria the day after you left."

Scott smiled. "Really? God, I haven't seen her in years. Maybe we could go visit her sometime. Where is she staying?"

Vincent hesitated. "Zoe's house."

Scott blinked. "Is that a joke? Please tell me it's a joke."

"No. It's not a joke."

Mike scoffed. "Good, because if it was, it would be a shitty joke."

Scott shot him a glare. "There are still kids here. Watch your language." He looked back at Vincent. "Did she tell her anything?"

Vincent scratched his neck nervously. "Um, well, kind of. I mean, it wasn't actually just her. I kind of did, too. But nothing happened, so I think it would be okay if-"

"What were you thinking?" Scott grabbed his brother's shoulders. "You know they don't want you telling anyone! You know what they could do if you did something they didn't like!"

"Look, Scott, I didn't 'sleepwalk' at all during that week," Vincent pointed out. "They weren't paying attention at all when I was speaking to Charlie. They weren't even talking! I don't know where they were, but they don't know that I said anything."

Scott sighed. "William, I just don't think it's a good idea to take risks like that."

"And I won't," Vincent promised. "But there is one thing that I told Zoe and Fritz that they're probably going to figure out."

Scott raised an eyebrow. "What is it?"

Suddenly, Mike's phone rang. He pulled it out of his pocket and looked at the screen.

 _From: Zoe_

 _Hey mike. Are you free tomorrow? Fritz and i wanna talk to you_

Mike looked at Vincent. "Are you fucking serious?"

Vincent smiled sheepishly. "Sorry?"

 **sry for the short filler chapter some stuff will actually happen in the next one**


	40. Chapter 40

**ShoutOuts: None**

 **Chapter 40**

 ***The next day***

Fritz was surprised when Vincent gave him the night off.

"You've been working really hard," he'd said. "You deserve a break. I'll take the shift with Scott."

He'd mentioned Scott, so Fritz figured that he and Mike were back from the funeral. Fritz knew that Vincent was giving him the night off so he would be able to talk to Mike the next day, but if he kept getting days off, his sleep schedule was going to be all kinds of fucked up.

Fritz woke up at 11 a.m. and sighed. On normal work days, he slept until 12, ate lunch, stayed awake for 6 hours to eat dinner, and continued sleeping until 11:45, when he would make his way to the pizzeria for his shift. Everything was carefully planned out, and he hated it when something suddenly happened that would change his schedule. However, he was eager to talk to Mike and possibly get some more answers, so he kicked off his covers and hopped out of bed.

 _ **xXx**_

 ***6:58 p.m.***

It was almost closing time, and Mike was nervous about his meeting with Zoe and Fritz. He glanced at Zoe, who was helping a parent find their kid within the throng of people whilst being questioned endlessly by a couple of fangirls who had decided to come back to the restaurant. He admired the way she was able to simultaneously calm down the parent and answer the fans' questions while keeping her cool. She was a good friend. He hoped she didn't hate him after his explanation.

He looked at Jeremy, who was in the Prize Corner, having a conversation about some kind of manga/anime thing with Mari and a couple of fangirls who shared the same interest. Mike wished he could tell Jeremy, but he didn't think Jeremy would believe him. He wanted to tell Raina too, but she probably wouldn't believe him as well.

As for Fritz, he hoped he wouldn't hate him after their conversation either. Sure, they'd never really been close, but they were still friends and coworkers. He hoped he believed his explanation.

Mike's watch beeped. It was 7 o'clock. Closing time. As soon as everyone was out of the restaurant, Fritz would meet them at Mike's house, and Mike would give them the answers they wanted.

 _ **xXx**_

 ***15 minutes later***

Fritz arrived at Mike's a few minutes late, and he hoped that Mike hadn't started in with his explanation without him. He ran in, immediately launching into an apology as he shucked off his jacket. "I'm sorry I'm late, I was sleeping and I was still kind of tired, so I took a couple of minutes to wake up fully-"

"It's okay, Fritz," Mike interrupted, his head in the fridge. "Hey, do you want anything to drink?"

He shook his head and sat down on the couch next to Zoe, a bit uncertain. He'd never been to Mike's house before, and he hadn't expected to see that it was so clean and organized. "No, I'm good."

Mike shrugged as he pulled out two cans of beer and handed one to Zoe. "Suit yourself." He cracked open the can and took a sip, flopping down in a chair across from Zoe and Fritz. "So, before you start firing questions at me, I just want to let you know that I can't tell you everything. There are a few things that just wouldn't be safe to share with you."

Zoe and Fritz exchanged a glance. Neither of them knew quite what to say. There were a few awkward moments of silence, and then Zoe finally spoke up. "Why can't you tell us everything?"

Mike sighed. "Fuck, I was hoping you wouldn't ask that." He paused and took another sip of beer. "Okay. You know how Wi- er, _Vincent_ 'sleepwalks', right?" he asked, making quotations in the air with his fingers as he said "sleepwalks".

Fritz nodded hesitantly. "Uh, yeah, but what does that have to do with you not telling us-"

"Just listen," Mike interrupted. "He- um, I-" Mike sighed. "God, I don't even know how to explain this. Or if I even can."

"It's okay," Zoe said. "Take your time." Her unopened can of beer sat forgotten on the table in front of her.

Mike took a deep breath. "Okay. I'm just going to start at the beginning here."

Fritz raised an eyebrow. "Beginning? What do you mean?"

"I mean with Fredbear's Family Diner." He took a drink of beer and set it back on the coffee table. "There was this guy named William Afton, who owned the pizzeria. Eventually, William wanted to open up a new restaurant, so he built some new animatronics." Mike gulped. "Um, I'm not so sure if I can tell you this part."

"Just tell us as much as you can," Zoe encouraged. She was leaning forward in her seat eagerly.

"Okay. So, William made these new animatronics and brought them to Fredbear's to showcase them. But something went wrong, and one of the animatronics killed a child."

"The Bite of '87?" Fritz asked.

Mike shook his head. "No. This was in 1983. The year you were born. And it didn't bite the kid. There was no blood, and the body was inside the animatronic after. I'm not sure. I wasn't in the room when it happened, and I was still pretty young, so I don't remember it too well."

"So William made these animatronics to kill children?" Fritz asked.

"No," Mike said immediately. "He just made them for entertainment. He didn't think they would kill anyone. Besides, he's a really good mechanic. He wouldn't be able to fuck up that badly."

"Then how did the animatronic kill that kid?" Zoe wondered.

Mike glanced around the room nervously, as though he were afraid they were being watched. "That's something I can't share."

Fritz nodded, slightly disappointed. "Okay. But I just want to know, what does this have to do with Vincent?"

"I'm getting to that," Mike assured him. "So, the kid was dead and William was blamed for it. Scott, who's my dad and William's brother, by the way, was able to convince the police that William was innocent. He quit working at Fredbear's and all of the animatronics were shut away. Eventually, one of Charlie's brothers, Michael, went missing." Mike looked around again. "Um, then a few years later, I decided to get a job at a warehouse where some old employees were keeping the animatronics." He gulped. "Ah, a bunch of stuff happened, and William and I almost died. Again, I can't tell you how we almost died, or how we survived, or what happened in that warehouse, but it's pretty gruesome and I don't think you'd want to hear it anyway. So Fredbear's was shut down because of this, and then, a few years later, it reopened and Jeremy got a job as a nighttime security guard."

"I remember that," Zoe commented. "We were still in high school, and Jeremy wanted to get a job so he could get money and go to college."

Mike nodded. "Yeah. As you know, there were more murders there, and it was closed again. Then it was reopened, and I took the job because no one else would. Scott was there too, helping me along like he did with Jeremy. The fourth night on the job, Dad was attacked. I can't tell you who did it, but William had been there in a hidden room, working on the old Toy animatronics. He was able to get to him in time, and he survived. A few days later, William fired me to keep me safe. He decided to close Freddy's for good and he started by destroying the animatronics." Mike hesitated. "I- I can't tell you that next part, but after, William ended up in one of those springlock suits."

"You mean the ones from Fredbear's?" Fritz asked. "Those ones that people can use as costumes?"

"Yep," Mike confirmed. "Scott found him and was able to get him out before he died. Then, somehow, another Fazbear place opened, called Fazbear's Fright."

"That's the place Charlie worked at," Zoe pointed out.

"Exactly. William hadn't opened it, and neither had my dad. We had no idea who made that place, so I decided to get a job there to see if I could find out what was going on. Some person I'd never met before told me how everything worked, and they told me to just explain it to Charlie over the phone, like Scott had done when Jeremy and I worked at Freddy's. So that's what I did. On Charlie's seventh night, I ended up in a springlock suit. I can't tell you how, but that's just what happened. At the end of her shift, Charlie came into my office to get her weekly paycheck. She saw me, got me out, and took me to a hospital. Then Fazbear's Fright burned down. Eventually, William and Scott decided to rebuild the original restaurant, and everyone got their jobs back. We tried rebuilding the animatronics, and eventually we got you to rebuild them." He shrugged. "And that brings us to the present."

Fritz thought for a moment. There were a lot of holes in his story. How the animatronic killed that kid, how Michael went missing, who attacked Scott, how he and William almost died, who opened up Fazbear's Fright, and how they ended up in those springlock suits. It was completely unbelievable. No one in their right mind would believe Mike's story.

"Sorry, I just don't get it," Zoe said. "You couldn't have been alive in 1983. We went to kindergarten together. You were the same age as me. I remember that. And you never got a job at a warehouse. You would have told us. This is impossible."

Mike sighed. "Zoe, that never happened. When the kid died, a bunch of shit happened, and we changed your memories so it would seem like I've always been here. We couldn't have certain people believing that I was still alive, and I needed a completely new identity. I changed my last name to Schmidt, and we created a background story for me. We needed someone to be able to back up that story, so we chose you, Jeremy, and Raina."

"But we were friends." Zoe said, her voice thick with emotion. "Going swimming in the summer, all those sleepovers, going to Freddy's together. That _can't_ be fake."

Mike looked at her, a sad expression on his face. "It is. I'm sorry, Zoe."

Fritz squirmed in his his seat, feeling uncomfortable. He felt like he was intruding on a personal conversation.

Zoe shook her head. "I don't believe you. There's no way you can change people's memories. That's impossible."

Mike raised an eyebrow. "Okay. You don't believe me. Fritz? What about you?"

Fritz hesitated before he spoke. "Um, not really. I mean, none of this seems possible."

Mike sighed. "I guess you'd need proof."

"Yeah, but where would you get that?" Zoe snapped. Now she seemed less sad and more angry. "Would you show us the dead kid's body? Introduce us to William Afton himself? How can you prove something like this?"

Mike shrugged. "Well, I can't very well introduce you to William, as you already know him. But I can-"

"Wait, wait, wait." Fritz made a _time-out sign_ with his hands. "We already know him? Who is he?"

"Vincent," Mike said casually, as though what he had just said made complete sense.

Zoe threw her arms up in the universal _I give up_ gesture. "Okay. That's it. I'm out." She stood up and started towards the door.

"Just wait!" Mike stood up and grabbed her arm. "Zoe, please. Just listen. I'm not lying. I swear."

Zoe looked at him. She apparently decided that he was being sincere, because she sat back down on the couch. "Fine. Continue."

Mike sighed in relief (he was doing a lot of sighing today) and lowered himself back into his chair. "Okay. So you know how the springlock suits work, right?"

Fritz nodded. "Yeah, I think so. When someone uses it as a costume, the springlocks are held back by some kind of weird mechanism. I don't really understand it, to be honest, but when they're not being used as costumes, the springlocks are released and they snap in, forming an endoskeleton kinda thing so it can operate as a normal animatronic."

Mike nodded. "Any person that was still in there while the springlocks were released would have been pierced by metal and plastic. If the person survived, it would have left some pretty nasty scars."

Zoe sat forward. "Is that where Vincent's scars came from?"

Mike shook his head. "No. Those are from something else-"

"That you can't us about," Fritz finished.

"Exactly. Anyway, I got stuck in a springlock suit when I was about thirty-one, seven years ago. You guys would have been twenty-five at the time. That was two and a half years before I met you." He turned to Zoe. "Zoe, do you remember the last time me, you, Raina, and Jeremy went swimming together?"

Zoe stared at him, obviously taken aback by this sudden change of subject. "Um, yeah. We were twenty-three. Then we all started getting jobs. Jeremy and I went to university for a few years after, and Raina started working at some fabric store. When we came back, the owner of that place had died and left Raina to run the place. You hadn't done anything with your life yet," Zoe added with a fond smile. She was talking fast, as though trying to convince herself the memory was real. Fritz got the feeling that that was exactly what she was doing.

Mike nodded. "That was before I _actually_ met you, and after I got stuck in the springlock. You remember how I looked then, right? I didn't have any scars or major injuries in that memory?"

Zoe shook her head uncertainly. "Uh, no. No you didn't."

Mike rubbed his neck nervously. "Well, I do now." He stood and grabbed the ends of his shirt. "I don't really like showing these off, but it's the only proof I've got at the moment." He quickly peeled off his shirt, and Zoe and Fritz gasped.

His skin was horribly scarred, with raised white lines that scored his flesh in a symmetrical pattern, each side of his body mirroring the other. Mike raised his arms out from his body and turned slowly in a circle, giving Zoe and Fritz ample time to see that the scars were everywhere, covering his back like a faint lace shirt, stretching to the waist of his pants as if they continued all the way down. On the back of his neck, where they were the largest and most visible, two scars like parallel lines were etched from the nape of his neck all the way up to his scalp, disappearing into his hair.

Zoe shook her head in disbelief. "Those can't be real," she whispered.

"They are," Mike assured her. He tugged his shirt back on. "Even ask Charlie. She saw me in that suit." He shuddered, as if even thinking about the springlock suit brought the pain back. "Trust me."

Zoe slumped in her chair, looking defeated. "So our entire friendship is based on a lie."

Mike shrugged sheepishly. "I wouldn't say our _entire_ friendship. Just some of it."

Fritz sighed. He had the feeling that these two were about to have a really sad, personal conversation, and he wanted to stay out of it. He glanced at his watch and stood up. "Oh, would you look at the time. I need to be on the night shift in a few hours and I still need to eat supper and have a quick nap. Um, thanks for talking to us, Mike, and just to be clear, I do believe your whole story, but I just really need to go."

Mike nodded. He looked a little surprised, as though he'd forgotten Fritz was even there in the first place. "Yeah, sure. Uh, thanks for listening, I guess."

Zoe stood up and made her way to the door as well. "I should probably go too. Bye, Mike."

Mike looked at her sadly as she put on her jacket, purposely avoiding his gaze. "Bye Zoe. I'll- um, I'll see you at work."

"Uh-huh," Zoe hummed absently, putting on her boots. She was out the door within seconds.

Fritz looked back at Mike, who was still staring at the door. "Seriously Mike, thanks for telling us what was going on. Well, mostly," he added, thinking of all the blank spots in Mike's explanation.

Mike nodded. "And thank you guys for listening. William, Scott, and I have been wanting to tell someone else about this for years." He gave Fritz an unexpected smile. "Thanks."

Fritz hesitated, then smiled back. "No problem." He turned and walked out the door.

 **yeah i know the entire paragraph about mike's scars is from The Silver Eyes there's gonna be more from the book in here just deal with it**


	41. Chapter 41

**ShoutOuts: antoniojones123 (thx :) )**

 **Chapter 41**

Zoe walked into the pizzeria a couple days later, still tired, as she had stayed up late finishing up repairing Charlie's car. She had asked her about her job at Fazbear's Fright, but Charlie had avoided most of her questions.

So, despite Mike's explanation two days ago, Zoe was even more confused now than she had been before. There were so many blank spots in his story. Zoe had tried figuring them out herself, and she'd asked Charlie multiple times, but never got any answers. She was going to question Charlie again this morning, but she had already left for work by the time Zoe got up.

As soon as she entered the restaurant, Zoe immediately started looking around for Scott, Vincent, and Mike. The animatronics were already there; they must have started walking to work instead of getting people to drive them all the time.

Mike was in the Prize Corner, helping Mari and BB organize prizes on the counter. He hadn't even looked up when Zoe came in. Scott was sitting on the stage, trying to tune Bonnie's guitar, while Vincent was repairing a gash in Springtrap's arm. He either didn't notice or didn't care that he was bleeding in the same place.

Zoe looked back and forth between Mike and Scott. Now that she knew they were related, it was easy to spot the similarities between the two. Mike didn't have Scott's black hair or his green eyes, but they were both tall and lanky, and their speech patterns were practically the same.

As for Scott and Vincent, it was extremely hard to believe they were brothers. Scott had black hair, green eyes, and was really pale. Honestly, if he had red eyes and fangs, he could have been a vampire. Vincent's hair was purple, so Zoe had no idea what his natural hair colour was, but his eyes were blue, and his skin was light brown, much darker than Scott's skin tone. Really, the only thing the two of them had in common was their height, Vincent being only slightly shorter than Scott. Oddly, the possiblility that Vincent and Scott could be brothers was one of the only things Zoe found unbelievable about Mike's story.

Zoe looked back at Mike. He was still not looking at her, seeming overly focused on the plushies and candies he was placing on the counter. She felt a pang of guilt. Even though their friendship hadn't started the way she thought it had, there was no reason they couldn't still be friends. Yeah, sure, so he'd lied to her about her entire childhood. So what? She still thought of him as a friend, and this wasn't going to change that.

She took a deep breath. "Hey, Mike!" she greeted loudly, hoping he would hear her from the entrance.

Mike glanced up from his work and saw Zoe. He stared at her for a moment, then hesitantly gave a small wave.

Zoe smiled and walked over to her position in the hall. She didn't say anything else. She didn't need to. Zoe knew that that exchange, however small, had preserved their friendship.

 _That's one relationship saved_ , Zoe thought. _Maybe I should try fixing the other._

 **xXx**

 ***Sometime after work***

Zoe drove up to Raina's house at about 7:45 p.m. Raina would have closed up her store a half hour earlier and would probably be home by now. It was dark out; the sun had set about a half hour ago.

Zoe walked up the driveway and rang the doorbell. A few moments later, the door opened, and Raina appeared in the doorway. She looked disheveled, and though her outfit was colourful, it wasn't quite as elaborate as it usually was. She was wearing jeans with butterflies stitched onto the pockets, a simple pink t-shirt, and blue ballet flats. Even her cat, Sirius Percival Wilmington III, seemed to be looking up at his owner in surprise.

Raina sighed. "Hi, Zoe. What are you doing here?"

Zoe opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. What _was_ she doing? What was she supposed to say?

Zoe closed her mouth and cleared her throat. "Um, I was wondering if maybe you'd like to go out somewhere." The atmosphere was suddenly immensely awkward, and she didn't know why.

Raina shuffled her foot on the floor, staring down at it nervously. "I don't know. I thought you were going to be hanging out with Charlie."

Zoe shrugged and scratched the back of her neck. "Nah. I'd rather be with you."

Raina looked up at her, still scuffing her foot on the floor. She studied her face for a moment, then smiled hesitantly. "Okay. Just let me get ready."

Zoe smiled back. "Okay. I'll just wait outside."

Raina nodded and disappeared back inside.

 ** _xXx_**

 ***Fifteen minutes later***

Zoe and Raina sat outside at a café, Zoe sipping at a cup of coffee and Raina with hot chocolate. Raina had put on a purple belt and her hot pink jacket, so now her outfit was a bit more colourful. They hadn't spoken much during the walk there, but they had spoken _some_ , so at least Raina was talking to her now.

Zoe blew on her coffee and took a sip. "So," she said, trying to make conversation, "how's your shop doing?"

Raina shrugged. "Pretty good. Charlie stopped by a week ago. Said she wanted to apologize."

Zoe furrowed her eyebrows. "Apologize? For what?"

"Dunno," Raina replied, taking a long drink of her hot chocolate. "Has she found a place to stay yet?"

Zoe nodded. "Yeah. She's actually moving out tomorrow."

"Really?" Raina said. "Well, good for her." She was obviously pleased by this news and trying to hide it.

Zoe decided not to comment on this. "You made any fun clothes lately?"

She had expected Raina to immediately light up at this topic, but instead she just seemed to deflate."No, not really. I haven't really had any inspiration lately."

"Well, where does your inspiration usually come from?"

Raina shrugged. "Anywhere, really. Picture books, paintings, gardens, other stores."

Zoe thought for a moment. Then she smiled and stood up. "Come on. Let's go."

Raina stood up hesitantly. "Go? Where?"

Zoe tossed some money onto the table with one hand and grabbed Raina's wrist with the other. "We're going to to go get your inspiration back." She ran off, pulling a confused Raina behind her.

 ** _xXx_**

Within a few minutes, they had reached Zoe's destination. Raina was even more confused now; Zoe hadn't answered any of her questions on the way here.

"Why are we at the park?" she asked, gazing up at the trees surrounding the area. They were lit only by the dim moonlight, and it was hard to see.

"Parks have flowers, flowers are colourful," Zoe said simply, pulling Raina through the metal gate. "This might help with your inspiration problem."

Raina sighed, not wanting to tell Zoe the real reason behind her lack of inspiration. "I don't know. I think I'd rather just go home."

Zoe turned around and raised an eyebrow at her. Raina looked at her for a second, then gave in and let her drag her into the park. She couldn't pass up a chance to spend time with Zoe.

"Do you have your sketchbook with you?" Zoe asked, even though she probably already knew the answer.

"Yep." Raina dug it out of her tote bag, along with a pencil. "I always do."

"Good," Zoe said. She dragged Raina along the path to the centre of the park. They passed many trees and flowers, but Raina didn't feel a single spark of inspiration. She'd seen all of this before. There was nothing new here.

Then they reached the middle of the park, and Raina gasped.

She'd been here before, multiple times, but she'd never seen it at night. The moonlight washed over the plants, bathing them in a beautiful silvery glow. The light bounced off the polished stones on the paths and illuminated the water in the fountain in the middle, making it look like liquid silver. The flowers that decorated the park had abandoned their usual bright colours and took on various shades of grey and blue.

"This is amazing," Raina whispered. Her brain was suddenly flooded with ideas. She immediately sat down on the nearest bench, flipped open her sketchbook, and began drawing.

Zoe sat down next to her. "You inspired yet?"

"Heck yes," Raina replied, not looking up from her book. It was difficult to draw in the dim light, but she did her best.

Zoe sighed. "I always like coming here at night. It's so quiet."

Raina nodded, still not looking up. "Yeah. I can see why. It's really pretty, too."

"I actually wasn't sure if you'd like it here or not," Zoe said. "I mean, you're all colourful and loud, and this place is so dim and quiet."

Raina looked up at Zoe. The moonlight had turned her brown hair almost grey, and her green eyes looked blue. There was a small grease smudge on the side of her face that she probably hadn't noticed.

Zoe turned and looked at Raina. "Hey, could I have some paper and a pencil?"

Raina was slightly confused by this request, but she ripped out a blank piece of paper. "Okay." She rummaged through her bag, but couldn't find any more pencils. Stupid. She should have thought to pack extras. "Sorry, I don't think I have any more pencils. I have pencil crayons, though," she added, digging out a black one.

Zoe took the paper and the pencil crayon. "Thanks." She picked a flat-ish rock off the ground and set the paper on it. She began drawing, occasionally glancing up at Raina.

"What are you drawing?" Raina asked curiously, leaning over to peek at her picture.

"You," Zoe answered simply.

Raina felt her face heat up. "Oh." She hesitated, then asked, "Why?"

Zoe shrugged. "Dunno." It was hard to tell in the dim light, but Raina thought she might have been blushing.

Raina stared at her for a second. Then she smiled, flipped her sketchbook to a new page, and started to draw.


	42. Chapter 42

**sorry I didn't update for a couple weeks**

 **idk why I didn't though like I had this chapter all planned out and I was writing some of it over the february break but I guess I just never got around to finishing it**

 **ShoutOuts: None**

 **Chapter 42**

 ***One week later***

Fritz walked into the pizzeria the next day at 12 o'clock, right on time for his shift. The room was dark; they had to turn the lights off every night to conserve power. There was light coming from under the kitchen door, so Scott must already be there. He quickly made his way to the hallway, blindly bumping into tables and pushing chairs out of his way. He glanced nervously at Vincent's door as he passed it in the corridor. After listening to Mike's story a couple nights ago, Fritz had been a bit weary of his boss. Despite Mike's reassurances that Vincent wasn't the murderer from the 1980's, he was still a little suspicious.

Fritz sighed and sat down behind the desk, ready for another boring six hours of work.

 ** _xXx_**

 ***3:11 a.m.***

Fritz sighed and leaned back in his chair. At this point, he was just absentmindedly scrolling through Facebook on his phone. It was pretty cool that he got paid for doing literally nothing, but he wished his job was a little more exciting. Sure, he occasionally got attacked by slightly murderous robots, but he thought that was more terrifying than fun.

He heard something from the hallway and sighed. "If you're here to kill me, can you fuck off? I'm tired of your shit."

There was no response, so he figured it wasn't Scott. He grabbed his flashlight and shined it down the hall. He saw that Vincent's door was open and groaned in frustration. He was a little scared, but not at all surprised. He was actually almost expecting this to happen. He turned off the flashlight and stayed quiet, waiting for something to come out. Sure enough, he saw a small pale shape waddle out of the room and start making its way towards him. Another one followed close behind it, clumsily crashing into the walls as it stumbled after its friend.

Fritz sighed. _Not these things again_ , he thought to himself. He decided to just sit there and wait for Scott or Vincent to show up and deal with them, because he had no idea what else to do.

Then he spotted four more smaller shapes crawling out of the room, quickly scrambling towards him in the dark.

Well, now he was getting a little bit nervous.

He heard a high-pitched giggle, and something else appeared in the hallway. It was a small blue shape that was pulling itself towards him, scraping across the black and white tiles.

And _now_ he was scared.

He stood up and grabbed the flashlight off the desk, ready to use it as a weapon. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath in an attempt to calm himself. _You've dealt with animatronics before_ , he told himself. _And those ones were much bigger and much more dangerous than these ones. You can do this. You'll be fine._

He opened his eyes again and looked at the animatronics, ready to defend himself. Then he noticed that there were only three of the smaller crawling shapes. _That's weird_ , he thought. _I could have sworn there were four._

Then he felt a sudden sharp pain on the back of his head, and his vision went black.

 ** _xXx_**

Fritz opened his eyes, a headache pounding in his skull. He was sitting propped against a wall. He tried to move his arms to push himself up, but they were pinned to his sides. He tried to move again and winced. His arms and torso were covered in random places of sharp pain. He looked around; he appeared to be in some kind of basement or storage room. There was a set of stairs leading up on the far side of the room. Cardboard boxes and cleaning supplies littered the floor, along with- wait, was that an animatronic head?

He squinted. Everything was blurry. He must have lost his glasses somehow. He tried to scootch closer to see it better, but his stomach flipped and the pounding in his skull grew more intense. He closed his eyes, waiting for the nausea and pain to recede.

After a few seconds, the pain in his head faded to a dull throb, and he took a deep breath. He looked down at his body to see his restraints.

He was inside the furry torso of an animatronic suit. His arms were pinned in by some sort of framework, the arms of the suit hanging limp from the sides. There were other things inside the suit, pieces of metal that pressed against his skin. Something pressed into the sides of his neck. He tried turning his head to see, but it dug into his skin. He tried once again to stand, but this brought on another wave of pain and nausea.

"I wouldn't do that," a feminine voice sang. Something moved from the corner of the room, and Fritz squinted, trying to see it. It didn't really help that the only light in the room came from a dim bulb on the ceiling whose light didn't quite reach some parts of the room. But he didn't need to see to know that the voice belonged to one of the little baby animatronics.

It started making its way towards him, tripping over its own feet and bumping into boxes. A box from the opposite corner of the room fell over, and the other baby robot fell out, landing on its face. It quickly righted itself and joined its friend. The four small ballerina animatronics tumbled out of another box closer to him, crawling towards him on all fours like spiders. The bunny animatronic (which, he realized, didn't have any legs) yanked itself out of another box, pulling itself along the floor.

Fritz sighed. "Not you guys again," he said, trying to hide his fear. "Why are you trying to kill me, anyway? What did I ever do to you?"

The animatronics ignored him and continued walking towards him. He had no idea what they were going to do when they reached him, but he decided he didn't want to find out.

Suddenly, he heard a door slam from the direction of the stairs. Footsteps echoed off the walls, getting louder as the person got closer. Fritz sighed in relief. Was someone coming to save him?

"FUCK!"

There was a loud crashing sound as whoever it was fell down the stairs, scaring the animatronics away from Fritz. He winced in sympathy as the person tumbled off the last step and fell into a pile of empty boxes.

Vincent pushed himself to his feet, accidentally bumping into the wall. "Mother fucking son of a bitch," he muttered.

Fritz shifted nervously in the suit. "Uh, Vincent? A little help here?"

Vincent shook his head vigourously and looked around the room, disoriented. His eyes widened when he saw Fritz, and he ran over to him, tripping over boxes. He skidded to a stop and knelt in front of Fritz. "Oh shit, did the Minireenas do this?

Fritz stared at him. "The Mini- what?"

"The Minireenas," Vincent repeated, pointing at the little black and white ballerinas, which were now hiding behind a pile of boxes. "They have a bad habit of kidnapping security guards and putting them in springlock suits."

A wave of fear washed over Fritz. "Springlock suits?"

Vincent nodded. "Yeah. Which is why it would be best to get you out of that as soon as possible." He moved so he was beside Fritz. "Okay, I'm going to need you to move away from the wall."

"But this is a springlock suit," Fritz reminded him. "If I move too much, won't the springlocks-" His voice tapered off. He didn't want to think about it.

"You're just going to have to trust me."

Fritz tried to turn his head to look at him, but the springlocks dug into his neck and he gave up. "No offence Vincent, but I don't really trust you."

"I know." He didn't sound very surprised by this news. "But if we don't get you out of this, you're dead."

Fritz hesitated, then nodded. "Okay. I'll try." He took a deep breath and tried to ignore the fact that anything he did could trigger the springlocks and crush him. He slowly shifted his arms so his hands were touching the floor, fearfully aware of the metal pressing against him, waiting to snap. He carefully lifted his body off the floor with his hands, pushed himself forward, and lowered himself back down. The movement brought on more nausea, and he clenched his teeth until it passed.

He heard Vincent shuffle along the floor. "I can't quite fit. I need you to move a bit more."

Fritz gulped. "Again?"

"Look, do you want to get out of this thing or not?"

"Well yeah, but what if I trip the springlocks?"

Vincent sighed. "Look, Fritz, if I don't get you out of there, your breathing will eventually trigger the springlocks one way or another."

Fritz hesitated. "But-"

" _Fritz_ ," Vincent interrupted. "If you trigger those springlocks, they'll snap right into you, making deep cuts all over your body, and a split second later, all the animatronic parts they've been holding back, all that sharp steel and hard plastic, will instantly be driven into your body. You'll die, but it'll be slow. You'll feel your organs punctured, the suit will grow wet with your blood, and you'll know you're dying for long minutes. You'll try to scream, but you'll be unable to. Your vocal cords will be severed, and your lungs will fill with your own blood until you drown in it. _Do you want that?_ "

Fritz shuddered. "No."

"Well, there's a chance that won't happen if you move again. If you don't get out of that suit, you're definitely dead. Either risk dying now with a possibility of survival, or die later. Your choice."

Fritz swallowed nervously. "Okay." He put his hands on the floor, lifted himself up, and pushed himself forward. His stomach flipped and he almost threw up, but the nausea receded quickly.

Vincent moved behind him. "Okay. I have to disable the springlocks at your neck first, then I can undo the back of the costume and get you out. But you can't move at all. Got it?"

Fritz almost nodded, then stopped himself. "Uh, yeah. Got it."

He felt Vincent's fingers reach into the costume and take hold of one of the springlocks. The metal pressed harder against his neck, and Vincent's hand slid out of the costume. "Shit," Vincent muttered. "I can't fucking get it," he whispered angrily, standing up. "I'm going to get someone else. Just hang on," he said at a normal volume.

Fritz glanced nervously at the little animatronics. "Um, what about them?"

"They won't try anything," Vincent promised, glaring at each of the robots in turn. "They know I'm coming back." He turned around and jogged up the stairs, occasionally tripping on a step and cursing at his own clumsiness.

As soon as he was gone, the bunny animatronic pulled itself out from behind a box. Fritz tensed up nervously, but the bunny just stared at him, its ears tilted at a jaunty angle. Fritz heard the hushed voices of the two baby animtronics in the corner. The ballerina robots pulled themselves out of a box and scrambled across the floor. One of them was running instead of crawling, and it appeared to be carrying something in its thin little hands.

Fritz squinted. "Hey! Those are my glasses!"

The bunny giggled as it watched this little scene play out. Suddenly, Fritz heard the door at the top of the stairs open, and the animtronics all scuttled into boxes. Footsteps echoed off the walls as Vincent and someone else made their way down the steps.

"Fritz?" Zoe's voice called. She and Vincent appeared at the botton of the stairs, although from a distance, they both just looked like blurry blobs.

"Are you okay?" she asked, running towards him.

Fritz tried to nod, but the springlocks dug into his neck. "Uh, yeah. At the moment."

Vincent jogged across the room to join them. Zoe turned around to look at him. "How did this happen?" she asked, glaring at him accusingly.

Vincent held his hands up in surrender. "Hey, don't blame me. I tried my best to keep them in my room, but apparently they know how to unlock doors."

Zoe knelt next to Fritz. "So how do we get him out?"

Vincent sat down next to her. "I'll walk you through it. You just need to get behind him first."

"'Kay." Zoe shuffled along the floor until she disappeared from Fritz's vision. "Okay. Now what?"

"You need to reach into the costume and grab one of the springlocks on his neck."

"Be careful," Fritz reminded her. "I'd rather not die, thank you very much."

"I'll try," Zoe promised. She wedged her fingers in between Fritz and the springlock. "Okay, I've got it."

Vincent stood up and looked into the back of the costume. "Okay. Reach down farther. There should be a trigger there. You need to pull it so the springlock will snap. It might hurt your hand a bit."

Fritz heard Zoe take a deep breath behind him. It was a little unnerving, feeling Zoe's hand pressing against his back. He liked his personal space, and really didn't appreciate it when people touched him. However, he knew that it was necessary for him to get out of the costume, so he didn't complain.

"I think I've got it," Zoe muttered. He heard a loud _snap_ , and almost jumped at the noise. Fortunately, he was able to stay still.

"Good," Vincent said. "Now you need to pull that one out and do the same with the other."

Zoe removed her hand, and Fritz shifted in the costume trying to get comfortable (or as comfortable as one could get while stuck in a death trap). One of the pieces of metal at his neck was gone, which was good because it had been starting to dig into his skin.

Zoe stuck her hand into the costume again to remove the other springlock. Fritz wasn't surprised when it snapped this time, as he'd been expecting it.

"Okay." Vincent backed up a little so he could see the back of the costume. "Zoe, you see those fasteners on the back there?"

"Yep," Zoe replied.

"Alright, you need to undo them. The leather might be stiff and the metal is probably rusty, so it'll be difficult to work them free without moving the costume too much. Just try to keep the costume exactly as it is until all the fasteners are undone."

"Okay." Zoe shuffled on the floor behind him. Leather creaked and metal clicked as she unfastened the clips holding the suit together. The costume loosened a bit, and Zoe hurriedly clamped the sides back together. The springlocks tensed and pressed tighter against Fritz, but they didn't snap.

Zoe sighed in relief. "Okay. I got it. What now?"

"Zoe, you need to open the suit and throw it forward," Vincent instructed. "Fritz, when she does that, you need to pull out of it as fast as you can."

Fritz felt Zoe grab the sides of the costume. "Alright. You ready Fritz?"

Fritz braced his feet against the floor. "As ready as I'll ever be."

Zoe took a deep breath. "One... two... three!"

Zoe pulled the costume open and flung it forwards. At the same time, Fritz pushed himself back, roughly crashing into Zoe, who bumped into the wall behind her. The costume tumbled across the room, making a series of snapping sounds as all of the springlocks went off at once.

Fritz groaned. He felt horrible. His head was swimming with pain, and his stomach felt like it had been turned inside out.

Vincent approached them hesitantly. "You okay, Fritz?"

"Yeah, I'm just fine," he replied with as much sarcasm as he could muster. "I mean, I feel like shit and I just survived a death trap, but yeah, I'm great, thanks for asking."

"You sure?" Zoe asked, scootching out from behind him. "You don't look so good."

Vincent knelt down in front of him. "His eyes are unfocused; he might have a concussion."

"Or he just needs his glasses," Zoe said, taking them away from the Minireenas and handing them to Fritz.

Fritz rubbed his eyes and put them on. His headache had actually been starting to fade a bit, but there was still a dull, aching throb at the back of his head. He raised a hand to touch it, and immediately winced. "Ow..."

"They probably hit you on the head when they knocked you out," Vincent said, grabbing Fritz's arm and helping him to his feet.

"Here, I've got him," Zoe said, taking Fritz's other arm and putting it around her shoulders. They began making their way to the stairs.

"Okay." Vincent let go of Fritz and walked over to the Minireenas. "Come on you guys. We're going back upstairs." Fritz heard the shuffling of boxes behind him as the ballerina animatronics came out of their hiding places.

Zoe and Fritz began walking up the stairs. He could hear faint voices from the door above. How long had he been out? Were they even still in the pizzeria?

He heard loud, heavy footsteps below him. He stopped turned around, afraid that maybe the animatronics were after him again. Fortunately, it was just Vincent. The two baby animatronics were clinging to his legs and giggling as he walked, while the Minireenas were hanging from his shirt, their stick-like fingers tangled in the fabric.

"Where's the bunny?" Fritz wondered.

Vincent lifted his hat to reveal the blue rabbit. "He likes it up there 'cause it's dark," he explained.

Vincent put the hat back on his head and they continued up the stairs. Zoe opened the door and they emerged in the brightly lit room backstage. Fritz blinked. After being in such a dim room for so long, the bright lights were slightly disorienting.

Zoe opened the door to the dining room and walked out with Fritz. The room was filled with kids, running around and drawing on the walls. Fritz looked up at the clock on the wall. It was 10:27. He blanched. He'd been out for 7 hours?

Vincent shut the door behind them. The animatronics that had been clinging to him a minute before were gone. "Well," he sighed, straightening his hat, "I guess we should get back to work."

Zoe raised an eyebrow. "Uh, where did the robots go?"

"I'm leaving them in there for now," Vincent answered. "I would keep them in there indefinitely, but they get really twitchy when they don't have any human interaction for a few days, and nobody really goes backstage often." He looked at Fritz. "Anyway, you should probably get home. And take a couple days off. You deserve it."

He turned around and walked towards the hallway. Fritz squinted. It was a little difficult to see from this distance, but he couuld have sworn he saw a bloody piece of metal sticking out of his arm.

 **ayyy more stuff from the silver eyes**


	43. Chapter 43

**idk what the fuck happened to vincent's character**

 **like at the beginning he was like "i'm scary and intimidating and an extremely hateable person" and now he's just "look at my smol animatronic children fUCK I TRIPPED OVER A CHAIR"**

 **ShoutOuts: None**

 **Chapter 43**

 ***One month later***

 _Goldie was in the restaurant again. He glanced around. He appeared to be under a table. He put a hand up to his face and felt tears spilling down his cheeks._

"He hates you," _a voice suddenly spoke up. He looked around for the source of the voice and saw the large picture of the yellow bear on the wall._

 _Goldie gulped. He didn't know who the bear was talking about, but he had the feeling that he didn't want to know._

"You have to get up," _the bear continued._ "You can get out this time, but you have to hurry."

 _Goldie hesitantly crawled out from under the table and stood up. He looked to his left. There was a set of doors there, and unlike last time he was here, there was no animatronic blocking the way. He glanced around. If he tried to leave, wouldn't somebody try to stop him?_

 _He walked over to the door and looked back. No one seemed to notice he was leaving. He pushed the doors open and stepped outside._

 _There was a car sitting in the parking lot, and he saw the little yellow bear plushie hiding behind it, watching him. He immediately felt better knowing that he wasn't alone, but he was still scared. He wasn't safe until he was back home, wherever that was._

 _There was a girl standing in the parking lot, all alone, hugging a yellow bunny plush to her chest. Goldie approached her. She seemed to perk up as soon as she noticed him. She held out the bunny for him to see. "Where is your plush toy? Mine is Spring Bonnie," she said excitedly._ _Goldie pointed at the yellow bear hiding behind the truck, but she didn't seem to notice it, and instead continued talking. "My Daddy says I have to be careful with him or I will pinch my finger." She looked at the plush fondly. "He is a finger trap, he says." The girl hugged the bunny to her chest once more, looking satisfied having said her piece._

 _Goldie stared at her for a moment, then shrugged and continued on his way. He walked over to the sidewalk on the edge of the parking lot. He proceeded to walk along the sidewalk until he saw another little girl. This one had red hair and bright green eyes, and was not carrying a plush. Goldie started towards her and saw the head of the bear plush sprouting out of a flower. He found this a bit strange, but he was glad to know that it was still with him._

 _Goldie walked up to the girl. She didn't seem to notice him at first; she was just staring off into space. Suddenly, she jumped and backed away from him, as though he'd scared her. "You'd better watch out," she whispered, a hint of a warning in her voice. "I hear they come to life at night."_

 _Goldie stepped away from the girl. What was she talking about?_

 _"And if you die," she said, "they hide your body and never tell anyone."_

 _Goldie shivered. This girl was freaking him out. And why did she look so familiar?_

 _Suddenly, the girl smiled, as though nothing was wrong. "Why do you look so worried? See you at the party!" She giggled, and skipped away._

 _Goldie blinked in confusion as he watched her retreat. What had that been about? He was starting to get scared now. He ran down the sidewalk and came across a boy sitting on the side of the road. He was laughing horribly loud, and Goldie was surprised he hadn't heard him sooner._

 _Goldie walked up to him, glancing around for the yellow bear. Sure enough, there it was, hiding in a drain next to the sidewalk._

 _The boy laughed harder when Goldie reached him. "Aren't you the kid who always hides under the table and cries?"_

 _Goldie felt his eyes well up with tears again. He didn't want to be known as that kid._

 _"No one else is scared!" the boy pointed out when he saw Goldie's tears. "Why are you? Stop being such a baby!"_

 _Goldie wanted to point out that he was, in fact, a baby, at least right now, and if he could change that, he would. Unfortunately, his crying made it really hard to speak, so he gave up and continued along the sidewalk. Eventually, he came across another boy. This one was holding a pink balloon and standing next to a blue car parked on the road. He looked up as Goldie approached. "Are you coming to the party?" he asked. "Everyone is going to the party." He studied Goldie for a moment, then laughed. "Oh wait, you have to go! It's YOUR birthday!"_

 _Goldie was confused. He was throwing a party? He shook his head and left the boy behind. He saw a house up ahead, and he was sure that it was his. He ran up to the door and reached for the doorknob. He had to jump to grab hold of it, but he eventually got the door open and walked through. He entered in the living room and saw the yellow bear sitting on the couch._ "Be careful," _it warned as Goldie walked towards it. He picked it up and carried it with him through the doorway to the right. He walked past a grandfather clock and into the room with the pink bed and robot parts. He heard a deep, rumbling laugh when he walked in, and immediately turned around and ran out of the room. He heard more laughter as he passed the clock, so he quickly dashed into the room with the four plushies sitting in a group against the far wall. Unfortunately, as soon as he entered, someone in a red fox mask jumped out at him from under the bed, making a loud screech/roar/growl sound. Goldie screamed and collapsed on the floor in a fit of tears._

"Tomorrow is another day."

 _ **xXx**_

Goldie shot up straight in his bed, breathing heavily. For a moment, he thought he was still in that dream, but after a few seconds, he realized that he was safe in his bed at home. He sighed in relief, but then remembered that this house was likely the same one as the one in his dreams. He had the sudden urge to look under the bed for the fox-masked person.

He glanced to his left at the other four small beds in the room. It was still pitch-black, but luckily he and the other animatronics had been built with a flashlights in their eyes. He turned them on and saw Mari, Springtrap, Chica, and Freddy all sound asleep, the sounds of Mari's music box echoing through the room.

Suddenly, Chica's voice was screaming in his head. _GOLDIE! GOLDIE, WHERE ARE YOU?_ Her voice lowered to a panicked whisper. _Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit, this is bad, this is bad, this is bad!_

 _Goldie!_ Orange's voice called. _Dude, where are you?_

 _Grey, do you know where he is?_ Chica asked, a worried tone in her voice.

 _I don't know!_ Grey shouted, sounded just as concerned. _I thought we had him!_

 _GOLDIE, WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?_ Red shrieked.

 _Dude, you need to chill,_ Violet said.

 _You don't understand!_ Red yelled. He sounded even more scared than Chica and Grey combined. _I don't want him to go through this again!_

 _Red, maybe you need to-_ Chica started, but Red interrupted. _NO! You don't get it! All of this was my fault in the first place, and if it happens again-_

 _What's going on?_ Goldie asked.

Everyone went silent. Then they all started talking in his head at once, Red's voice being the loudest.

 _Oh my god, thank fuck you're-_

 _HOLY SHIT WHERE WERE YOU-_

 _-glad you're okay, we were getting-_

 _-WAS SO WORRIED-_

 _-didn't know where-_

 _-DON'T YOU EVER DO THAT TO ME AGAIN-_

 _What's going on-_

 _-ALMOST GAVE ME A HEART ATTACK-_

 _Calm down!_ Goldie yelled, and the shouting ceased. _What's going on? Why did I have another one of those dreams? Where were you guys?_

 _Where were WE?_ Red bellowed. _Where were YOU? I was worried sick, Michael!_

 _Red!_ Grey yelled. _Calm down! The good thing is, he's back now._

 _How did that happen?_ Goldie asked. _I thought I wouldn't be having any more of those dreams. You guys said you were protecting me from those._

 _We were,_ Blue replied. _Maybe some other spirit blocked us from you?_

 _It's possible,_ Grey mused. _I have noticed that there's been unusual spirit activity, especially around the pizzeria and this house. Maybe a few of them got lost and wandered it way into Goldie's mind, breaking our defences._

 _I don't care how it happened!_ Red exclaimed. _As long as it doesn't happen again._

 _Right,_ Magenta agreed. _If we lose control again-_

 _That would be bad,_ Turquoise concluded.

 _That would be HORRIBLE,_ Red corrected. _This can't happen again. I wouldn't-_ His voice suddenly broke off, as if he were interrupted mid-sentence.

 _Oh, he must have woken up,_ Pink observed.

 _Well, we still have a couple hours of sleep left,_ Amber said. _Goldie, why don't you go back to sleep and finish charging?_

Goldie heard footsteps down the hall of the left hallway and shook his head. _Yeah, sure. You guys just go back to the dreamscape. I'll join you in a minute._

As the voices faded from his head one by one, Goldie pushed the covers off him and stood up. He walked over to the door and opened it slowly, being careful not to make any noise. He poked his head out and glanced down the hallway. Foxy was walking towards him, his one eye lit up so he could see in the dark house. Goldie quickly turned off his own flashlights so the light wouldn't irritate Foxy like it had before.

Foxy saw oldie and jumped, obviously surprised that Goldie was already awake. "Goldie!" he whisper-shouted. "What are you doing up?" He turned off his own flashlight, as he probably thought that the light still affected Goldie the same way it did him. Goldie decided not to tell him that it didn't, because that would just confuse him and raise a lot of questions.

"I could ask you the same thing," Goldie said.

Foxy furrowed his brow. "Hmm. Well, I asked first."

"But I asked you second," Goldie fired back.

"That makes no sense."

Goldie sighed. "Alright. I couldn't sleep," he lied. "What about you? What are you doing over here? Isn't your bedroom over there?" Goldie pointed back down the hallway Foxy had come from.

Foxy shrugged. "Yeah. I- I don't know." He stared at Goldie for a second before hesitantly asking, "Are you okay?"

Goldie thought for a moment. "You mean aside from the fact that I keep having recurring nightmares, and voices are yelling in my head most of the time, and I'm a dead child who's possessing the body of an animatronic and I most likely died a very painful, horrible, untimely death? Yeah, I'm perfect, thanks for asking."

Foxy blinked. "What?"

Goldie waved away the question. "Whatever. What about you?"

"I'm fine..." Foxy still looked incredibly confused. "Um, are you sure you're fine?"

"Yeah, I'm good."

Foxy stared at him. "Okay... Well, I'm just going to go back to bed then..." He turned and walked back down the hallway, muttering to himself.

Goldie sighed and went back into his room.


	44. Chapter 44

**sorry i didn't update for a while i've been busy with homework and stuff**

 **hopefully the updates will get more frequent as we're nearing the end of the story**

 **but here's one last filler chapter before we get back to the good shit**

 **ShoutOuts: None**

 **Chapter 44**

 ***2 weeks later***

Zoe sat down at the control panel in the Parts and Service room. She'd recently been working on blueprints for new, smaller animatronics. Tia was having a lot of issues keeping up with the orders in the kitchen, and Tonnie and Teddy couldn't serve pizza to everyone at once, son she wanted to make some more robots to help with their jobs. Fritz was helping too, but he wasn't back from lunch yet, so she was on her own for a few minutes.

The picture Raina had drawn of her a while ago sat next to the blueprints. It was shaded expertly in silver and blue pencil crayon, and there were no smudges or out of place lines. Zoe smiled. Even though it was a picture of herself, she thought it described Raina perfectly, organized and perfect.

"Hey Zoe!" a voice said from the door. Zoe turned around and saw Raina walking in, wearing an incredibly colourful outfit. Now she always stopped by the pizzeria at lunch whenever Zoe was working. Zoe did the same on her days off.

"Hi Raina," Zoe greeted, pushing her chair away from the control panel. "How's work going?"

"Great," she replied, setting her tote bag down and sat in Fritz's unoccupied chair. "I just finished making a few of my newer designs and put them in the window of the shop. A lot of people have commented on them already. Said they're looking forward to seeing the rest. Anyway, how's it going here?" she asked.

Zoe shrugged. "Well, we're making some progress. I haven't actually started building them yet because I'm still working on the designs."

"That's cool," Raina commented. "Um, hey, can I ask you something?"

"Uh, sure," Zoe replied. "What is it?"

"Do you want to go out on a date?"

Zoe blinked. She automatically thought of the last time someone had asked her that, when she was stil in school.

"Do you want to go out on a date?" he'd asked, his warm brown eyes staring at her intently, his smile kind and understanding.

She'd been taken aback by this question, but she smiled back, rubbing at the fading bruise on her face, and accepted his offer.

"I'm sorry," Raina apologized, interrupting her thoughts. "I just thought I'd ask. Forget it." She picked her tote bag off the floor and started to stand.

"No, it's fine!" Zoe said quickly, putting a hand on Raina's knee to stop her. "I'd actually love to." She hesitated. "It's just-"

"You're still thinking about Travis," Raina finished.

Zoe sighed. "Yeah. I'm sorry."

Raina sat back down. "I understand." She paused, as though she wasn't sure whether she should keep talking. "What about your mom?"

Zoe shuddered. "I'd rather not think about her." Zoe's mom had been an alcoholic when she was younger. Zoe and her father would leave the house every time she drank too much, but once they'd made the mistake of going home too early. Her mom was in the midst of a drunken rage and decided to take her anger out on the two of them. Zoe had gone to school the next day with multiple bruises.

Travis, however, was a completely different story. After Zoe had told Raina and Jeremy about her mom (she remembered telling Mike too, but of course now she knew that was fake), Travis had come up to her and they struck up a conversation. Apparently, his father was the same as Zoe's mother. They bonded over this, and he'd eventually asked her out. Years later, after they graduated, they'd gotten married. They had eventually had a kid, and Travis had wanted to name them Dylan, but Zoe suggested that they name them something gender-neutral, because they didn't know what gender their kid would grow up to be. Travis didn't like it, but he'd grudgingly agreed, and so they'd named their kid Jesse. A month later, Travis had gotten really mad when they had just been talking and Zoe had nonchalantly mentioned that she used to date girl named Hannah before she ot together with Travis. He'd blown up, saying that he hadn't known Zoe was "one of _those_ people" and that he didn't want their kid growing up around someone like her. The next day, Zoe had woken up, and both Travis and Jesse were gone.

Zoe wasn't hesitant to go out with Raina because she wasn't over Travis. She was hesitant because if they got really serious and wanted to get married one day, they couldn't because Zoe had never gotten divorced.

Raina put a hand on Zoe's shoulder and looked at her sympathetically, as though she knew exactly what she was thinking. "Hey, it's okay. If we ever get to that point in the future, we can work around it."

Zoe leaned forward and hugged her. "Thanks Raina."

Raina hugged her back and then pulled away. "So, is that a yes?"

Zoe smiled and nodded. "Yeah."

 **sry for the short chapter i just wanted to get zoe's backstory out of the way**

 **i'll actually have some real plot happening in the next chapter**

 **like nothing really big will happen but i'm working up to that**


	45. Chapter 45

**ShoutOuts: None**

 **Chapter 44**

 ***6 days later***

Freddy sighed as he woke and sat up in his bed. He didn't want to get up. Work was starting to get boring, as it was just the same routine over and over, every day. He didn't really look forward to going.

But something was nagging at the back of his mind. He tried to latch onto it, but a crash from the opposite side of the room interrupted his thoughts.

"FUCK!" Springtrap's voice yelled. He looked up to see her pulling herself off the floor, tangled in blankets. She must have fallen off the bed in her sleep.

Mari sighed from the bed next to Springtrap's. "Thanks for screaming in my ear," she said sarcastically. "I appreciate it."

Chica sat up and swung her legs off her bed. "Well, I guess we're all awake now."

Everybody got out of bed and began getting ready for work. As Freddy buttoned up his waistcoat, he couldn't help but think that something was off. Mari wasn't chattering excitedly about her manga books like she usually was, and was instead getting dressed quietly, with a worried, thoughtful look on her face. As soon as Springtrap was dressed, she sat down on her bed and pulled out her sketchbook. This wasn't unusual, but there was a look of concerned urgency on her face, as though if she didn't get her thoughts down on the paper immediately, they might disappear forever. Chica and Goldie were acting mostly the same, having a hushed conversation in the corner of the room as they got dressed.

That nagging feeling came back, and Freddy tried desperately to figure out what it meant. But the feeling slipped away again before he could figure it out.

 _ **xXx**_

Tonnie took a deep breath as he entered the pizzeria, inhaling the scent of crayons and pizza. Usually he was happy to go to work, but something kept poking at his thoughts, interrupting his good mood. Usually, he and Mangle would be running into the restaurant, shouting and laughing. But something was different this time.

The feeling had started a couple days ago. It was almost unoticable at first, and he thought nothing of it, but now it was impossible to ignore. And as far as he knew, it was affecting everyone else, too. Zoe had come to work the previous day, and she hadn't made any progress on the new little animatronics. Vincent hadn't come out of his room much at all over the past few days. Scott said it was because he was sick, but Tonnie had never seen him get sick at all for the past eight months they'd been working.

Tonnie shook his head vigourously, clearing the thoughts from his head. He just had to get through this work day.

 _ **xXx**_

Charlie sat down at her desk in her classroom, pulling a sandwich out of her bag. She usually ate her lunch in the staff room, with the other teachers, but she hadn't interacted much with the rest of the staff for the past couple of days. She just felt really off lately. She wondered if maybe she was getting sick.

She contemplated her sandwich for a moment, then closed the container it was in and put it back in her school bag. She just didn't feel like eating.

Charlie looked around the room. Yeah, maybe she was getting sick, but she didn't think that was the case.

Teachers and students alike bustled about the hallways, the children talking and laughing, the teachers yelling at the kids to calm down. Voices and footsteps echoed throughout the building, making their way into Charlie's classroom. She sighed and walked over to the door, shutting it to quiet the noises.

She looked around the room. There was no one else in there with her.

But she just couldn't shake the feeling that she was being watched.

 _ **xXx**_

Foxy spread his arms and flopped backwards into the foam pit in Pirate's Cove. It was their three o'clock break, and the morning had been just as boring as ever.

"Ugh," Bonnie sighed as he strolled into Pirate's Cove, tossed his glasses off to the side, and fell into the foam pit next to Foxy. "I'm so done with this."

"You're telling me," Teddy replied, toppling face-first into the foam pit. "It's so repetitive," he said, his voice muffled by the squishy blue squares.

"I know," Foxy said. He enjoyed their one-hour breaks. They actually got to do what they wanted for once.

Foxy looked sideways at Teddy. He opened his mouth to say something, probably another comment about how horribly boring their jobs were, but the words caught in his throat when he saw something on Teddy's neck.

"What in the name of Blackbeard is that?" he asked, sitting up.

"What?" Teddy wondered, lifting his head up so he could talk. "What's happening?"

"Look," Bonnie said, pointing. He was sitting up too. He reached out of the pit and grabbed his glasses.

Teddy raised his hand and touched his neck where Bonnie had pointed. He took his hand away and looked at it. "Um, there's nothing there, you guys."

"Yeah, there is," Foxy insisted. He reached out and tugged down the collar of Teddy's dress shirt.

Bonnie slid on his glasses and squinted. "Yeah, Teddy, your neck is _orange_."

Teddy furrowed his eyebrows. "Oh. Well, it was on my shoulder before, but I didn't think it would spread." He turned his head, trying to see it.

Foxy turned to look at Bonnie and caught sight of something on his hand. "Um, I don't think it's just Teddy." He grabbed Bonnie's wrist and held it up for him to see.

Bonnie blinked in confusion at his partially purple hand. "What the heck...?" he whispered. He looked up at Foxy and blinked. "Um, Foxy?" He pointed at his chest.

Foxy tugged down the collar of his shirt with his hook and looked down. The metal on his chest was dark red.

And it seemed to be spreading upwards towards his face.

 _ **xXx**_

Vincent sat down on his bed dejectedly. He felt horrible. He wasn't getting sick; he knew that much. He never got sick. There was a constant pain throbbing behind his eyes, but he knew it wasn't a headache.

He winced automatically as a piece of metal pierced through the skin on his arm. This was happening more and more frequently. He wished he could make it stop, but the ghosts were getting restless. He knew they were tired of being stuck in this body, and he was as well. They all wanted out, and so did he.

But he couldn't leave, not now. Not until he fixed what he had done. Not until the other ghosts were free.

 ** _xXx_**

Springtrap sat down on the floor after work and immediately flipped open her sketchbook. It was almost full. She'd have to ask Zoe or Fritz for a new one if she lived that long. There were so many things swirling through her mind, and she scribbled them all down on the paper in a matter of minutes. She had to get all of it drawn out before it was too late.

She was staring down at her paper, but she suddenly felt the urge to look up. She didn't want to. She didn't want to see that thing again. But her instincts won over and she tore her eyes away from the paper.

She blinked. It wasn't there anymore. Last time, there had been a creature standing in front of her. It had been transparent and humanoid. It wore a security guard uniform and carried a toolbox in one hand. It hadn't seemed very horrifying, just looking like an average person, but the way it had stared at her had seemed less than human, like it was a lion waiting to snap its jaws around her throat.

She glanced around the room. There was no sign of it. It must have left.

But she wasn't sure whether that was a good thing or a bad thing.

 _ **xXx**_

Chica sat down on the couch at home, feeling worried. The voices had gotten more urgent over the past few days, but today, they had just stopped. She and Goldie had both been very concerned for the entire day, and they tried figuring out what was wrong, but every explanation they came up with just didn't seem right.

Goldie sat down next to her and sighed. Everyone else was settling down, changing into shirts and jeans, talking about books and TV shows like usual, but they all seemed wary and scared. Mangle and Tonnie were huddled together in a corner, looking around worriedly as their older counterparts stood next to them. Bonnie's hand was on Tonnie's shoulder, and Foxy had put an arm protectively around Mangle. Tia walked over to the hallway next to the TV, probably going to the kitchen, but she as soon as she glanced down the hallway and saw that no one else was down there, she apparently changed her mind and sat down in front of the TV with BB and Mari.

The only person that didn't seem to be scared was Springtrap. She was sitting on the floor against the wall like always, drawing in her sketchbook. Chica found this weird. The voices had stopped, everyone was worried, and something was clearly going on. So why wasn't she affected like everybody else?

"Something's happening," Goldie observed unnecessarily.

Chica nodded. "Yeah. But what is it?" she wondered aloud, leaning forward and resting her chin on her hands.

"I don't know," Goldie replied.

She turned and looked at him. They didn't need to read each other's minds to know that they were both thinking the same thing.

Something was happening, and Springtrap was involved somehow.


	46. Bad Ending: Part 1

**ayy guess who's fifteen now**

(⌐■_■)

 **me that's who**

 **ShoutOuts: MagicMakerRose (Thanks! And you don't have to wait any longer, because here's the next chapter! Quick warning, the Bad Ending Part 2** ** _might_** **be a little sad, so prepare yourself)**

 **Bad Ending: Part 1**

 ***The next day***

Raina sat down at her table at home. She didn't have work at the pizzeria today, which was good, because everybody there was starting to freak her out. They kept jumping at small sounds and looking around as though someone were following them. It was pretty unnerving.

Although she couldn't blame them. She was just as worried and distracted as they were. There was definitely something going on. She just didn't know what it was.

She set a glass of water down on the table and put her phone next to it. Then she dug her sketchbook out of her tote bag and put it on the other side of her sewing machine. She glanced up at her wall, where Zoe's picture of her hung. She smiled. The picture depicted Zoe as much as it did her. It was roughly drawn, with black scratches in pencil crayon sticking out of the picture, smudges decorating the paper where her hand went over the coloured pencil lead. It described Zoe perfectly, messy and disorganized.

Raina shook her head, clearing out her thoughts of Zoe. She had a lot of work to do. She grabbed some dark blue fabric from a box next to her table and got to work drawing shapes and patterns where she would have to cut it to make her new outfits.

She heard a quiet meowing and looked down. Her orange tabby cat, Sirius Percival Wilmington III, was looking up at her with big blue eyes.

She sighed. "Sorry Sirius, I'm busy. I have to get this done." She turned back to her work.

She heard another meow, and her cat suddenly jumped up on the table. He sauntered over to her glass of water and butted it with his head.

"No, Sirius, don't-" She held out a hand to stop him, but he had already pushed over the glass. It tipped over and water splashed over her phone, rolling across the table and dripping onto the floor.

Raina sighed in frustration. "Seriously?" She looked at Sirius, who had jumped off the table and strolled away with his tail high in the air.

She rolled her eyes and picked up her phone. She walked over to the pantry, where a bag of rice already sat waiting. This happened quite often, so she had an entire bag of rice dedicated to drying out her phone. She plopped it into the bag and closed the pantry door to get a towel and clean up her cat's mess.

 ** _xXx_**

Vincent put down the book he was reading and sighed. He was tired of being stuck in this body, but more than anything, he was tired of staying in the pizzeria. He knew he had to stay here so the ghosts didn't get restless and kill everyone around them, but he just wanted to go somewhere else for once.

He jumped in surprise when his cell phone rang. He fell off the bed and hit his head on his nightstand. Bonbon giggled from under his dresser. He picked a book up off the floor and threw it at the animatronic. "Shut up," he said, scrambling for his phone. He accepted the call and put the device to his ear. "Hello?"

"Hey William," Scott's voice said.

Vincent raised an eyebrow. "Scott? Why are you calling me?" The closet doors opened behind him and the Bidybabs poked their heads out to hear the conversation.

Scott paused, clearly hesitant to continue. "Well, I just bought a dog-"

"You bought a dog?" Vincent exclaimed. "Why? You don't even like animals!"

"Yeah, I guess, but my neighbour's dog just had puppies, and I went over to see them, and they were really cute, and now I guess I've got a dog."

Vincent rolled his eyes. "Okay. And why, exactly, are you calling to tell me this?"

"Well, you know I've got the night shift tonight-"

"And you want me to take over so you can take care of your new dog," Vincent finished.

"Actually," Scott began, "I was going to suggest that you come and take care of her while I'm working."

Vincent blinked. "Scott, you know why I have to stay in the restaurant-"

"And I know that it's not good for you to stay cooped up in there all the time," Scott interrupted. "Come on William, you need to get out and do something."

Vincent thought about it. Animals didn't usually like him, but he was definitely tired of staying here. Maybe this would be just what he needed.

"Okay," he said. "We'll be there at eleven thirty." He hung up and set his phone back on the nightstand. He opened the drawer, and the Minireenas poked their heads out to look at him.

"Good news you guys," he said. "We're getting out of here for a while."

 ** _xXx_**

 ***10:00 p.m.***

Goldie sat down on his bed. Nobody else had gone to sleep yet, but for whatever reason, he was really tired. He felt like he hadn't slept in days. He had already changed into his pyjamas and was just about to go to bed.

The door suddenly opened and Mari walked in, still dressed in a t-shirt and jeans. She was rubbing her eyes and yawning, which was weird, because they weren't programmed to show signs of exhaustion. They weren't even supposed to get tired.

"Hey Mari," he said warily. "Going to bed already?"

She nodded. "Yeah. I feel like I haven't been charged in days." She lay down on her bed and closed her eyes as soon as her head hit the pillow, not bothering to pull the covers over her.

The door opened again and Springtrap entered with Freddy. They were both still wearing their work clothes, and they barely acknowledged Goldie as they flopped onto their beds and fell asleep.

Goldie stared at them. This was weird. Why was everybody so tired all of a sudden? He heard Mangle and Tonnie's voices down the hall as they walked towards their room. "I have a rip in my coat," Mangle complained.

"Didn't Zoe text Raina so she could come by and fix it?" Tonnie asked sleepily.

"I think so, but she never showed up." Their voices faded as they made it to their room and collapsed in their own beds.

Chica walked in, wearing her own pyjamas. "Hey Goldie," she greeted. "What's wrong?" she asked when she saw the concerned look on his face.

He shrugged. "I don't know. I just think it's weird that everybody's so tired all of a sudden."

Chica nodded. "Yeah. I don't know what's going on." She swallowed nervously. "But I think we're about to find out." She turned off the light and lay down in her bed.

Goldie sighed. She was right. Something was going to happen, and it was going to happen soon.

He lay down on his side and closed his eyes.

 ** _xXx_**

 _Goldie was trapped inside a small, dark room. He was facing the door, so he turned around to look at the rest of the room. There was an empty animatronic costume slumped against the wall, and shelves full of animatronic heads and endoskeleton pieces hung on one wall. The dark shadows in the room made them look like human skulls. He heard a deep, rumbling laugh coming from somewhere, and he began crying. He couldn't help it. He was terrified._

 _He turned back to the door. "Please let me out," he begged, hoping against hope that someone, anyone, would be able to hear him._

 _The door stayed closed. He began sobbing harder, terrified of the dead-looking things behind him. "PLEASE!" he shouted, hitting the door with his tiny hands. He turned and looked at the things, wanting to get as far away from them as he possibly could. He collapsed in a fit of sobs, curling up on the floor. "Please let me out..." he choked, in one last attempt for someone to hear him. Everything slowly faded to blackness, and suddenly, he was in the dining room in the restaurant. The picture of the yellow bear was on the wall like usual, but it wasn't speaking to him now. He was surrounded by four taller people, each of them wearing a different mask. There was the boy with the red fox mask, two others with a purple rabbit mask and a brown bear mask, and one girl with a yellow- was that a duck? No, it was a chicken. Chica the Chicken, the animatronic. So the fox must have been Foxy, the bunny was Bonnie, and the bear was Freddy._

 _"Wow, your brother is kind of a baby, isn't he?" Bonnie sneered._

 _"It's hilarious," Foxy chuckled. "Why don't we help him get a closer look? He'll love it!"_

 _Goldie didn't know what they were talking about, but he was sure he didn't want to find out. "No! Please!" he cried._

 _"Come on guys, let's give this little man a lift," Foxy said. "He wants to get up close and personal!"_

 _Suddenly, he felt Foxy and the kid with the Bonnie mask lift him up under the arms, the other two following behind and laughing._

 _"No!" Goldie shouted. "I don't want to go!"_

 _"You heard the little man!" Foxy cackled. "He wants to get even closer!" The other three laughed in response._

 _They reached the stage with the yellow animatronic bear and rabbit. The two robots had stopped singing and dancing, almost as if they were waiting to see what was going to happen._

 _Foxy snickered. "Hey guys, I think the little man said he wants to give Fredbear a big kiss!" He and Bonnie held Goldie up higher. "On three! One... two... THREE!" They hoisted Goldie up and shoved him into the animatronic's open mouth so only his legs were sticking out._

 _Goldie shrieked and flailed around in a panic, trying to get himself out of the bear's mouth. He felt the animatronic's jaws tighten around him, and he wiggled even more, trying to work himself loose. His torso was mostly out now, and he almost had his head loose, when suddenly-_

 _SNAP._

 _His head was filled with unbearable pain as the bear's jaws closed on his head, crushing his skull and everything inside it. The laughs of the four people behind him stopped abruptly, as though horrified at what they had done. Then all the sounds started fading, and his vision went black. He was losing consciousness, and he welcomed the darkness, letting it take away the horrible, horrible pain in his head._

 _Now he was sitting in a black room that was painted so dark he could barely see. The yellow bear plushie was sitting there with him, along with the other four plushes from his room. There was beautiful music coming from somewhere, but he couldn't figure out where._

 _"_ Can you hear me? _" the fox plushie asked, its voice echoing through the room. "_ I don't know if you can hear me. _" It paused for a moment. "_ I'm sorry, _" it apologized sadly._

 _"_ You're broken _." The golden plushie said. Behind him, the red headless fox melted into the darkness. "_ We are still your friends _." The chicken faded as well. "_ Do you still believe that? _" Now the bunny disappeared. "_ I'm still here. _" The brown bear faded too. "_ I will put you back together _." And finally, the golden bear slowly disappeared, the darkness folding around it like a blanket, until it was gone._

 _He felt the darkness loom up behind him. It washed over him like water, and he sat there and let it. His heart slowed to a dull thumping that throbbed every few seconds, until it eventually stopped. His vision darkened one last time, and he could faintly hear the sound of the sound of a heart monitor flatlining._

Goldie and Chica both woke with a start. One by one, each of the other animatronics woke up as memories flooded back into their minds.

 ** _xXx_**

 ***12:00 a.m.***

Zoe was sitting at her kitchen counter, staring down at the blueprints for the new animatronics. She hadn't made any progress on them for the past few days. Try as she might, she just couldn't focus.

She sighed and stood up. There was an odd feeling in her gut. Something felt... wrong. She just didn't know what.

She put her head in her hands and took a deep breath. Maybe she just needed to take a walk. She grabbed her coat and stood up. She didn't bother to lock her door behind her. She hopefully wouldn't be out for long.

As she walked, the feeling in her gut grew more insistent. After a few minutes, she realized that she was walking down the same street she usually took to get to the pizzeria. She hadn't really had a destination in mind, but maybe this was a good thing. Maybe going here would give her the inspiration she needed to finish those blueprints.

She turned onto the street where the pizzeria resided, and then she saw just what was wrong.

The animatronics were all walking through the doors of the restaurant, looking for all the world like zombies freshly risen from the grave. They slowly lurched into the pizzeria, tripping over each other and bumping into the doors.

She heard footsteps and turned around to see Mike running down the sidewalk towards her. "Zoe!" he called. "What's going on?"

She gestured to the robots. "I don't know! I just came here and saw this!"

"Hey guys!" Zoe and Mike whirled their heads around to see Jeremy running up to them, dressed in pyjama pants and a t-shirt. "What are you doing here?"

Zoe pointed to the pizzeria. "That's what we're doing here!"

His eyes widened. "What the-?"

He was interrupted when a bright blue car pulled up and parked at the sidewalk. Charlie opened the door and hopped out. She saw the animatronics and gasped. "What's going on?"

"We don't know!" Jeremy shouted, obviously panicked.

"What the heck?" Raina's voice yelled. She ran up behind Zoe and stopped beside her. "What are they doing here?"

"Wait!" another voice yelled. Zoe looked up and saw Vincent sprinting towards them, the two baby animatronics hanging onto his legs, the ballerinas clinging to his shirt, and the bunny peeking out from under his hat. For whatever reason, there was a Jack Russel Terrier running beside him, barking excitedly.

"William?" Mike exclaimed in surprise. "What are you doing here?"

"William?" Jeremy asked. "Who's William?"

"I'll explain later," Vincent said. He didn't even seem to be out of breath. "Right now, we need to get into the pizzeria and stop them from getting to Fritz and Scott."

"Why would they be after Fritz and Scott?" Raina asked.

"I said I'll explain later!" Vincent yelled as he dashed towards the restaurant. The animatronics were already inside, and they seemed to have locked the doors behind them.

Raina and Jeremy exchanged a confused glance. Neither of them knew what was going on. Who was William? Why were there little robots all over Vincent? And why did he have a dog? They both shrugged and ran after him. He seemed to know what he was doing, so they figured that following him was probably their best bet.

Zoe was also confused, but slightly less so. She was also a little unsure about why there was a dog here, but she chose to ignore it and just try her best. She ran after Vincent without hesitation.

Mike and Charlie looked at each other from across the street. They knew exactly what was happening. The ghosts had woken up, and now they were looking for revenge. If they saw William, they would go after him. The children didn't know who was really behind all this. They both dashed after the others towards the restaurant.

The others reached Vincent to see him trying to yank the doors open. "Damn it," he muttered. "They must have locked the doors." He looked up. He could see the animatronics inside, slowly making their way to the hallway. There were two shapes darting in and out of the mass of metal bodies. It was Chica and Goldie, both of them grabbing the arms of their friends and trying to pull them away, shouting and pleading for them to go back to the house. Vincent quickly tore his gaze away from them and reached into his pocket for his keys. His hand left his pocket with nothing. He frantically checked his other pocket, but all that was in there was some spare change.

He snarled in frustration and smacked the door with his hand. "Fuck!" He turned around to look at the others. "I don't suppose any of you thought to bring your keys?" His question was only met by blank stares and shrugs.

He sighed and backed away from the doors. "Alright, if any of you are sqeamish about blood or sharp things, you might wanna look away," he warned. He looked down at his feet, where the two Bidybabs were still clinging to his legs. "You two are going to have to keep me in check, make sure the others don't come out and try to kill anybody."

He heard a sad whine from above him and looked upwards at BonBon. "I'm sorry buddy. I know you want to see your old friend, but you know how dangerous he is." Vincent looked back down at the doors.

What he did next was so weird, Raina was half sure that she had been imagining it. Out of his arm, a line of small sharp blades poked through his skin. Blood dripped down his arm from the wound, but he either didn't notice or didn't care. He placed the blades in between the doors and began moving it up and down, accompanied by a loud scratching noise.

"What is he doing?" Raina whispered to Jeremy.

"He's sawing through the deadbolt," Mike answered. "Trust me, he knows what he's doing."

Vincent suddenly growled in frustration. "It's not working," he muttered. He glanced up at the animatronics, who were just walking past the Show Stage and were just about at the hallway. Chica and Goldie seemed to be slowing them down a bit, but they would eventually be overpowered. He sighed, as though regretting what he was about to do. "Alright. Plan B."

What happened next was even weirder than what he did before, and a lot more disgusting. The blades sank back into his arm, and instead a large gash seemingly appeared out of nowhere where the blades had been. His hand went limp and lost its shape, like a balloon deflating, and from the gash, a metal hand-looking thing emerged. He stepped back from the door and reared his arm back, the metal hand curled in a fist as though ready to punch it. Then he actually did punch it, all the strength in his body concentrated into one hard strike. The doors burst open, crashing into the walls inside the building and swinging shut. Mike shoved his foot into the opening before they could close completely.

The animatronics all suddenly whirled around at the noise, staring at them with blank, dead eyes.

"Holy _fuck!_ " Vincent yelled, clutching his metal hand with his normal one. "Shit, that _hurts!_ " The was a line of blood on his shirt where his shoulder blade was. The shirt was torn there, and a large disk of metal was sticking out of his back.

"What the heck is that?" Zoe asked, staring at the metal disk. She leaned in and studied the metal. "So, is your entire skeleton made of metal? Or is that just a prosthetic arm covered in some kind of fleshy rubber silicone?" She moved to his side so she could see his metal hand. "That's fascinating. How does it work?"

"Could you stop staring at me?" he said. As he spoke, the metal hand folded itself back into his skin, and the metal disk that was forced through his back retreated back into his body. He felt little needles poke through his skin, sewing the wounds closed. "It's making me uncomfortable."

Zoe backed away, sounding slightly disappointed. "Okay. Sorry." She looked up into the restaurant. The animatronics were still staring at them, their gears whiring as they processed what they were seeing. Then they all started walking towards the group, their bright eyes illuminating the dark room. They started moving faster, bordering on normal walking. Chica and Goldie seemed to notice this and started pushing tables in front of the advancing robots, trying to close them in so they couldn't do any harm. Unfortunately, the animatronics began crawling over the tables with ease. They were obviously getting used to their forms, as they began walking faster without tripping over each other.

And they were all glaring straight at Vincent.

The Minireenas crawled over his shoulders and cowered on his back, shaking with fear. The Bidybabs peered out at the approaching robots from behind Vincent's legs, talking to each other with hushed voices. Bonbon pushed his hat up to look. He immediately let out a terrified squeak and lowered the hat again.

"William, you should leave," Mike said, stepping in front of the doors.

"No." Vincent moved forward and stood next to him. "I started all of this in the first place, and I'm not leaving until I've fixed it."

Mike turned at look at him. "You didn't start this William, you know who really-"

"But they don't know that!" Vincent yelled, gesturing at the rapidly approaching animatronics. "I don't care who started this, I'm fucking finishing it!"

Charlie stepped forward and put a hand on Vincent's shoulder. "Well, don't think you're doing it without us."

Vincent stared at her for a moment. He looked behind him at Jeremy, Raina, and Zoe. They all looked a little confused and a lot scared, but they were all looking at him with the same determined expression.

He took a deep breath. "Okay. Here we go then."

 **this chapter was originally going to be longer but I just felt like I should get an update out so I split it into two chapters**


	47. Bad Ending: Part 2

**me: so updates should be coming out faster bc we're getting closer to the end of the book!11!1!**

 **also me: *doesn't update for 3 weeks***

 **me:** ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

 **ShoutOuts: Idk (thNK U)**

 **Bad Ending: Part 2**

Chica was freaking out.

She had no idea what was going on. All of a sudden, all of the other animatronics had just woken up and left the house. For whatever reason, a lot of their metal were different colours. Bonnie was completely purple, Foxy was dark red, and Teddy was a vibrant orange. Everybody else's metal was slowly changing into different colours, and she guessed that those three had just started changing earlier. Holes suddenly appeared in their metal too, revealing the silver endoskeletons beneath. Balloon Boy and Freddy still had the same skin colour they had before, except BB's nose was now a darker pink and Freddy's metal was just a slightly lighter shade of brown than normal. They were all changing to look more like the original animatronics.

Chica glanced down at her own body in her flannel pyjamas. If everyone was changing, why weren't she and Goldie both bright yellow by now?

"Chica!" Goldie's voice yelled. She whirled arond to see him trying his best to keep Springtrap away from the now open doors. She seemed the most determined to reach William out of all of them. Goldie pointed, and Chica followed his gaze to Foxy, who was running remarkably fast at the others outside the doors. Chica panicked and picked up the first thing she saw, which happened to be Bonnie's guitar, and threw it at him with all her strength. It hit him in the back and he went down with a loud crash.

Chica looked up at the doors and saw William talking to the others. Maybe he was laying out a plan. Maybe he knew what he was doing and knew how to stop this.

Then four small ballerina-looking animatronics suddenly dashed into the restaurant on all fours, Zoe following behind. The other animatronics saw her and began running after her, but Mike ran in and body-checked two of them into the Prize Corner counter. They started going after him instead, but Charlie dashed in and tackled them. When they started going after her, Jeremy and Raina ran in and started pushing the robots away from them. Each of them tied their best to keep the animatronics away from each other.

William ran in, two odd-looking baby robots clinging to his legs and a dog running behind him. Zoe and the other little robots had already disappeared down the hallway, and William followed after them, gesturing for Chica and Goldie to follow. The two sane robots exchanged a glance, then shrugged and ran after him.

They sprinted down the hallway and saw William standing in the open doorway of the Parts and Service room. He waved them inside and shut the door. Zoe and Fritz were inside, both of them standing around the control panel and frantically hitting buttons in a seemingly random order. The ballerinas were sitting on top of the panel, randomly playing with the dials and switches as though that might help. Scott was there too, leaning against the panel and watching the other two at work.

Goldie took a deep breath. "Okay. What the fuck is going on?"

"Watch your language," Zoe said automatically.

"Fritz and I came in here as soon as we heard you guys come in," Scott said. "We've been trying to activate that emergency shut-down thing that Zoe and Fritz made, but for whatever reason, it's not working."

Fritz growled in frustration and shut his laptop. "Why isn't this working? I've entered the password at least fifty times!"

Zoe sighed and sat down in one of the chairs. "I'm trying mine. It's not working either."

"Well, we need to do something!" William exploded. "The others are eventually going to get overwhelmed, and the animatronics will come this way, and if they find me, they'll find you, and then we're all dead!" He sat down in the other chair and put his head in his hands.

"We'll figure out something," Chica insisted. "We'll get out of here." She had to admit, the odds did not seem to be in their favour. But she had to stay hopeful.

Suddenly, she heard a faint laugh from the corner of the room. She and Goldie both whirled around to see what it was. There was a human-looking thing standing there, leaning against the wall and observing them with an amused look on its face. It was slightly transparent, and Chica could see the checkered wallpaper pattern through its body. It had a toolbox in one hand and was wearing a purple security guard uniform. It saw her staring and laughed again. It turned away, and to her surprise, walked straight through the wall.

She glanced at Goldie. They were both confused and a little scared. What was that thing?

She turned back to the others and saw William gazing at the spot where the thing had disappeared, his eyes wide with fear. He had obviously seen the thing as well. So why hadn't the other three?

Zoe suddenly raised an arm and slammed her fist down on the control panel. "Fuck! Why isn't this working?"

Scott moved so he was standing behind the control panel with her and Fritz. "Don't worry, I'm sure we can figure this out." His dog barked and put his front paws on the control panel.

William stared at them for a moment. The animatronics would soon overpower the others, and then they would come for him. And if they found him, they would find Scott, Zoe, and Fritz. He looked behind him at Chica and Goldie. They looked back at him with determined expressions on their faces. Although the three of them had never been close, each of them knew what the other two were thinking. Within seconds, they had a plan. It wasn't a very good plan, and it might cost them their lives, but it was their only option.

Zoe sighed in frustration and typed her password into the control panel again. It beeped and the words "INCORRECT PASSWORD" appeared on the small screen. Why wasn't it working? She was one hundred percent sure that she had typed in the right password.

Goldie and Chica suddenly grabbed Zoe's and Fritz's hands and dragged them over to the door. Vincent knelt and began crawling around, as though he was looking for something.

Scott walked over to the doors with Zoe and Fritz, his dog following after him. "What's going on?"

"You're getting out of here is what's going on," Vincent answered from the floor. When he stood up, he had something in his hands. Zoe craned her neck to see it, but Chica and Goldie pushed her out the door before she saw what it was.

"William, what-" Scott started, but he was interrupted when Goldie grabbed his hand and yanked him through the doorway. The dog barked and ran out with him, tail wagging.

"What are you doing?" Fritz asked nervously as Chica and Goldie pulled him down the corridor.

"Less talking, more walking," Goldie quipped, and started pushing Fritz more urgently.

Zoe exchanged a glance with Fritz and Scott. They all shrugged and began running with the two animatronics. They got to the dining room and saw Mike, Charlie, Jeremy, and Raina struggling with keeping the other robots at bay. Raina had a bloody gash on her forehead, accompanied by multiple bruises. Jeremy had a black eye and the sleeve of his shirt was soaked with blood. Mike and Charlie seemed to be mostly okay, but they were obviously getting tired and couldn't hold out much longer.

"Guys!" Chica waved her arms to get their attention. "We're getting out of here!"

The four of them immediately stepped away from the robots. "Where's William?" Mike asked as they ran over to the others.

"He'll take care of it," Goldie replied, pushing Mike over to the doors. "Just go!" Upon hearing Goldie's voice, Foxy suddenly whipped around to look at him. The enraged expression on Foxy's face immediately softened. He started running towards Goldie, who just looked at him sadly and continued pushing the others to the exit.

They got to the doors and Zoe felt Chica push her out. She turned around, fully expecting to see Chica and Goldie come out with them and close the doors behind them. Instead, she watched as they slammed the doors while they were still in the restaurant and shoved Bonnie's guitar through the handles so it couldn't be opened from the outside.

"Hey!" Jeremy yelled. "What are you doing? Open up!"

Goldie and Chica just looked back at them sadly. Then they turned and ran back towards the hall.

Charlie smacked her palm against the glass. "Michael Brooks, you get back here right now and open up this door!" She sounded like she was about to start crying.

Mike grabbed her wrist and pulled her away from the door. "Leave them, Charlie. They're already gone."

Charlie stared through the glass, tears streaming down her face. There was nothing they could do.

Meanwhile, Vincent was having problems of his own.

He heard Chica and Goldie shut the doors and Charlie's anguished cries from outside the pizzeria. Hearing that broke his heart, but he was just doing what had to be done.

He finished splashing gasoline over the floor and desk of the security guard office and then moved down the hallway to the party rooms. Goldie and Chica had to be here to keep the other animatronics from going after Vincent while he did his job, and Vincent he had to keep them distracted long enough so Chica and Goldie could get out through the back door in his room. Then he would get out and send the place up in flames. If the emergency button wasn't working, then this was the only way to dispose of all the robots at once.

He glanced down the hall. He had known all of the children before they had died. Sure, Bonnie, Freddy, and Chica had all had a hand in Michael's death, and Foxy had been the ringleader of their little group and a horrible brother to Michael, but that didn't mean they had to die for it. BB had been the youngest when he died, only four years old, and he had been the only one who could talk to Mari, the shy aspiring actor who always hung around the back of the restaurant. Teddy, Tonnie, and Tia were always running around, jumping in the ball pit one minute and stuffing cake in their faces the next. And Springtrap...

Vincent's heart clenched. He'd doubted it at first, but when he had glimpsed one of her drawings over her shoulder one day at the pizzeria, he was certain.

He heard Chica yell from the dining room, and he picked up the pace. Those two wouldn't be able to keep the robots at bay for long.

He finished with the party rooms and ran down the hall, flammable liquid trailing behind him, muttering curses under his breath. He'd been lost in thought for too long, and now he was running out of time. He would have to make this quick.

He dashed into the dining room and began dousing everything in gasoline as he ran. The animatronics shrieked when they saw him, and many of them were able to break away from Chica and Goldie. The other three spirits inside him stirred, as though they were going to burst if they didn't get out soon. He couuld empathize with them. He wanted out just as much as they did, but not before he finished his job.

Vincent darted around the animatronics, making sure to splash some gasoline on them as he passed. The robots missed every time they tried to hit him, as they were so ungulfed with rage that they probably weren't seeing straight. Chica and Goldie were still struggling to hold back the few that they had a hold on, but there was one animatronic that wasn't even doing anything. She was just standing there, staring at him.

Vincent faltered. He'd seen Zoe's blueprints for the robots before they were made, and he knew that Springtrap wasn't supposed to have green eyes, she was supposed to have brown ones. Yet here she was, her gazing eyes a bright, almost glowing green. She slowly stepped away from Goldie, who tried to grab her arm and pull her back, but she shrugged his hand off effortlessly.

Vincent shook his head and ducked as soon as Tia's fist swung over him in the space that his head had been moments before. He had to focus on his task.

He had mostly covered the dining room and figured that would have to be enough. He sinaled to Chica and Goldie and they broke away from the animatronics and started back down the hallway. On the way down the corridor, he caught sight of the Bidybabs, the Minireenas, and Bonbon. He had left them in Parts and Service, but they must have sneaked out when they heard him running. He looked at them sadly. He hated to leave them here to burn. Sure, they had gotten a lot better since they'd been away from _him_ , but he couldn't take any chances.

Then he heard a voice that stopped him in his tracks.

"Father?"

Chica and Goldie noticed him stop and looked behind them. "William!" Chica said, panicked. "Come on! We have to go!"

The voice came again. "Father? I know it's you."

He turned slowly. Springtrap was standing there at the entrance of the hallway, staring at him with those bright eyes. The other animatronics were standing behind her, standing absolutely still as though they were waiting for something. "Hello, Father," she said, her normal voiced replaced with a little girl's in a British accent. Oh, how he missed his own accent! He used to sound so elegant. Now he sounded _American_. Ugh.

Springtrap almost seemed to know what he was thinking, because then she giggled. "I know, right? I've never heard an American accent before now. They're very interesting, aren't they?"

He took a step back. "How did you do that?"

She smiled at him sadly. "I have a friend, Father. He did it. He told me what you were thinking." Her smile faltered. "He told me what you did. Why did you do that?"

He shook his head and stepped back again. "I didn't do anything. He did it. He's lying to you." As he said it, the words in his mouth felt fake, like he was the one who was lying. But he was telling the truth, wasn't he? He hadn't killed any of the kids! He'd cared about each and every one of them, even Michael's nasty older brother.

He felt Goldie's hand tugging on his wrist. "Come on, William, we don't have much time!"

"Father, don't listen to him." Springtrap took a step forwards. "Michael just doesn't want to die again. Only thinking of himself, as usual."

"That's not true!" Chica's voice yelled, but Vincent barely heard her. As Springtrap spoke, memories surfaced from the depths of his mind; tinkering with the animatronics for the sister location, warning his daughter to stay away from the sister location robots, glaring angrily at the kids in the restaurant while one hand rested on a knife on one of the tables. The three other spirits in his mind yelled at him, telling him that those memories were taken out of context, shown to him right now to make him panic. He though this odd, as those three ghosts had never liked him much and had always fought him for control over their body. But now they were trying to _help_ him, and he believed them too; he just didn't know why Springtrap wanted him to think he was the murderer.

He glanced around. Something had to be manipulating his memories. Logically, it didn't make any sense, as no one could go into other people's minds and change their memories. Well, no one _alive_ anyway.

Then he saw it. The ghost with the toolbox from the Parts and Service room flickered into existence next to Springtrap, whose eyes glowed brighter in it's presence. It smirked at Vincent and laughed silently before fading away again.

"It's him," Goldie whispered. He, Chica, and Vincent all exchanged a glance. The ghost was connected to Springtrap's soul. As long as its vessel, the animatronic, was still intact, there would be no getting rid of this thing. They still had to get out of the pizzeria so they could light the fire and burn the robots down.

Vincent quickly swung the half-empty gasoline can at Springtrap's head, and Chica and Goldie took off down the hall. The gasoline can hit Spring square in the face and she tumbled backwards, landing on her back. "OW!" she yelled, and he heard another voice layered underneath hers, a deep, gruff voice that sounded very angry. Vincent immediately dropped the can and dashed down the hallway. He heard the angry ghost's voice yell "GET THEM!" and Springtrap's voice managing to yell "Father, run!" before the ghost regained control over her. The footsteps of the animatronics echoed throughout the pizzeria, but none of them seemed to be getting any closer. All of them had probably tried to get into the hallway at once, and were now squished in the narrow corridor, trying to squeeze their way through.

Vincent reached Chica and Goldie at the door to his room. They were both desperately pushing on it, but the door wouldn't swing open. The Bidybabs and Minireenas were trying to help as well, and Bonbon was doing his best with the little grip he could get on it with no legs or feet to push off the floor with, but they didn't seem to be having any luck.

Chica heard Vincent and turned around. "It's locked!" she yelled in a panic.

Vincent glanced behind him. Springtrap was slowly stumbling down the corridor, clumsily crashing into the walls as she went, but it wouldn't take long for her to reach them. he heard a _crash_ as the other animatronics spilled into the hallway.

Goldie looked at Vincent and held out his hand. "I need your keys!"

Vincent frantically dug in his pockets for his keys to unlock the door, but then he remembered that he didn't have them. He looked up at the other two. "They're not here," he said, all the hope in his body draining out with those three words.

Springtrap suddenly rounded the corner, crashing into the opposite wall. "WILLIAM!" she shrieked angrily, the ghost's voice echoing beneath her own. She started down the corridor, but she slipped on a puddle of gasoline and fell down again.

Vincent looked back at Chica and Goldie. "It's your life, William," Chica said. "You decide."

Vincent turned to face Springtrap and pulled out his cigarette lighter.


	48. Bad Ending: Part 3

**ShoutOuts: ArchineerRob (thank you ! I love seeing supportive comments like this), and OrangyGinger (dont't worry, there will be a good ending! It might take a week or so to come out, but it'll happen sometime.)**

 **Bad Ending: Part 3**

 ***One week later***

The inferno had only lasted for five minutes before the fire department showed up. Charlie had called the police as soon as Goldie ran back into the restaurant, and minutes later, the fire started. Mike called the fire department after that, but it was already too late by the time they got there. They went through the building and came out with a body covered in a sheet on a stretcher. Everyone knew who it was, although they never said it aloud.

The next week was a blur. Mike, Fritz, and Jeremy had to find new jobs, and Raina and Zoe went back to their old routines of running their shops. Charlie's life didn't seem to change much, as she didn't have a job at the pizzeria before. Scott decided to go into retirement and spent most of his time at home.

Zoe couldn't sleep for most of that week. She knew the animatronics had only been metal things with A.I.s, but she couldn't help but feel how she did when Travis ran away with Jesse, like she lost a child. But this felt ten times worse. She hadn't even known Jesse for all that long before they were taken away, but the animatronics had had personality. She had cared about all of them, and now they were gone, burnt to a crisp, and there would be no funeral for them. Yeah, maybe it was silly, caring about robots like they were her kids, but she couldn't help it.

Vincent's funeral came around, and it passed by quietly. Aside from Charlie, Mike, Jeremy, Raina, Zoe, and Scott, barely anyone had shown up. There were no parents or siblings or friends, just a few adults and their kids who had known him through the pizzeria. She recognized the mom who was complaining about her daughter not winning a Foxy plush, her kid standing next to her. There was also that one man who was angry because his kid hadn't won a scavenger hunt. None of them looked angry now.

Zoe didn't remember the details, and the funeral was over before she knew it. Raina was driving the two of them back to Zoe's house when they turned down a different street. Zoe glanced over at her. "Where are we going?"

"Mike and Charlie asked to meet us," she answered. She took her eyes off the road for a moment to look at Zoe. "I hope that's okay with you. You can always take the truck and pick me up later."

Zoe shook her head. "No, it's okay. I think we should see them."

They pulled up to a house and Raina stopped the truck on the curb. There were already three other vehicles parked along the street. She recognized Fritz's grey minivan, Jeremy's silver convertible, and Charlie's little blue car (and horrendous parking job). Mike's red truck was parked in the open garage. They hopped out of Zoe's truck and walked up the driveway to the house.

Mike opened the door, still in his suit from the funeral. "Hey guys," he said. He sounded like he was on the verge of crying. "Glad you made it."

"Thanks for inviting us," Zoe said absentmindedly. She looked around the room. Jeremy was sitting in the armchair, staring at the floor and looking slightly traumatized. Fritz was sitting cross-legged on the floor, a can of pop forgotten on the coffee table. Charlie was on the couch, her eyes red and puffy like she'd recently been crying.

"Where's Scott?" Raina wondered, asking the question Zoe had been thinking.

"Dunno," Mike replied. "I invited him, but I don't think he's gonna come." He gestured to the couch. "You guys can sit down if you want. Sorry I don't have much room."

"S'okay," Zoe slurred as she and Raina sat down on the couch next to Charlie. "So why'd you invite us over?"

"So we can talk," Charlie said, her voice thick with emotion. She swiped at her eyes. "We can give you guys a full explanation now."

Mike nodded and sat down on the floor in between Fritz and Jeremy. "We were going to get Scott to help explain, but I don't think he's going to show up. I'm don't think it would be a good idea for him to revisit all this right now anyway."

Charlie took a shaky breath. "Okay. You guys might want to get comfortable. This is going to take a while."

"Wait." Jeremy spoke up before they could begin. "So you're going to explain why the animatronics went haywire and tried to attack us?"

"Well, that will be part of it," Mike said hesitantly. "This is probably going to answer some questions, but it might be confusing." He looked at Charlie. "Do you want to start?"

Charlie sighed and nodded. "Alright. I'll start with William and my dad." She swallowed nervously. "William Afton and my dad, Henry Brooks, used to own Fredbear's Family Diner together. William dealt with the animatronics and my dad handled the business part of the restaurant, like paying the employees and stuff. Eventually, Dad suggested that they expand the company by creating a rental company for the animatronics. Dad asked William to make some new animatronics. So William made the robots, and I don't really remember them much. Funtime Freddy was always my favourite," she added with a fond smile.

"William brought them to Fredbear's to showcase them," Mike continued, taking over as Charlie began to get off track. "But although Henry wasn't a mechanic, he'd always been fascinated with mechanics and stuff like that, so he decided to tinker with the animatronics and see if he could get them to do the opposite of what they were supposed to do."

"What was that?" Raina asked skeptically.

"Kill people," Charlie answered bitterly. "He wanted to see if he could turn kid-friendly robots into killing machines, and he did it."

"But William saw Henry backstage with the animatronics and became suspicious," Mike explained. "He warned his daughter to stay away from the robots until he could get a look at them, but she-" He stopped and looked down at the floor. "She didn't listen," he said, his voice thick with emotion.

"Eventually, his daughter got away from him and went to play with Circus Baby, the ringleader of the animatronics," Charlie announced. "She was killed. Nobody knew how, and even we don't know, but her body was inside the animatronic after, all folded up and crushed and-" She broke off her sentence and shuddered. "Ugh. Sorry. I'm not going to describe it. It's too disgusting. Anyway, Henry blamed the death on William, who was taken in for questioning. He was eventually declared innocent and quit working with Henry immediately. The sister location animatronics were shut away, and Spring Bonnie and Fredbear were taken with them. After that, Dad decided to just pack up and move away. Me and my brothers Michael and Daniel wanted to stay here, but Dad just seemed really eager to leave. Of course, I didn't know why at the time, but I did know that something was up."

"After Henry saw what he could with just one animatronic, he became obsessed with them," Mike continued. "He took the old robots and changed them so they would do horrible things in different situations. But he didn't want some random kid to just go up to them and die. He wanted to see if he could drive someone else to kill someone or themselves with the modified robots. He got an entire warehouse and built an entire environment under it. A restaurant, some small houses, and even an entire street with a sidewalk and everything. He'd gone absolutely mad with power, and started kidnapping people, kids mostly, to live in this underground place."

Charlie swallowed nervously. "I was always Dad's favourite, so I was safe from his experiments. Unfortunately, my brothers weren't. He put Michael on hallucinatory drugs and trapped him in dark rooms where he'd have to fend off imaginary monsters, and he kept talking to this Fredbear plush. Daniel and three others were all injected with some weird drug that made them act really aggressive. They constantly picked on Michael, and they eventually..." Her voice trailed off and she began to cry.

"They killed him," Mike finished quietly. "That was the Bite of '87. They put him in Fredbear's mouth, and the animatronic's jaw snapped shut on his head."

Zoe gaped at him in horror. What kind of man would do that to his own children?

"You guys can leave if you want," Charlie sniffled. "We understand if you don't want to hear anymore."

Zoe looked around, waiting for someone to stand up and leave, but no one did. Even Jeremy was still in his seat, although he was eyeing the door as though debating whether or not to make a break for it.

"Well, I guess we're all okay," Zoe observed. "Continue.

Mike took a deep breath. "Alright. So all of this happened over the course of a few years, and a few years after the Bite, I turned sixteen. I knew that there was something weird going on at this warehouse, so I decided to get a job there. Unfortunately, I didn't know that I had basically signed up to be a part of Henry's weird experiments. The job was kind of difficult because I had to deal with the modified sister location animatronics, but everything was going pretty okay until my fifth night on the job. Henry had built some kind of machine that would dispose of the bodies in the animatronics he used to kill kids, and-" He paused. "Well, this is going to sound crazy, but a ghost lured me to the machine."

Jeremy raised an eyebrow. "A ghost?" he asked skeptically.

Mike sighed. "I know, it's weird, but Henry only used the machine four times, once for each of the animatronics. Sometimes, he killed a kid with one and didn't take the body out of the robot for years. But he didn't really realize that the kids- well, they weren't really alive exactly, but-" He stopped and turned to Charlie for help.

"The kids' souls kind of used the robots as their vessels," Charlie continued. "They were alive and Henry only modified them to kill children, but the kids started going after Mike, too. William's daughter pretended to help him, but instead she got him to the machine and it..." She trailed off and thogh for a moment.

"It kinda scooped out my skeleton," Mike finished.

Fritz shuddered in disgust. "Eww, that's gross."

"It's even more disgusting if you're the one experiencing it," Mike said.

"But how did you survive?" Raina wondered.

"She promised I wouldn't die," Mike stated. "And when a ghost promises something, it happens, no matter how impossible it usually is."

"But why did she do that?" Zoe asked. "Scoop out your skeleton, I mean."

"They wanted to get out of the warehouse," Charlie explained, "so they all got scooped, formed parts of their vessels into one big skeleton-like robot, and went inside Mike's body so they could leave."

"I felt really sick for the next few days, and I kept hearing the ghosts' voices all the time," Mike said. "I don't remember much of it; those few months were kind of a blur. Eventually, Dad asked what was wrong-"

"Wait," Raina interrupted. "Who's your dad?"

"Scott," Mike answered. "Anyway, he asked what was wrong, and I told him and William. William went to confront Henry about it, and Henry tried to kill him. The robot skeleton- I think its name was Ennard?- decided to leave my body so they could go save William. I don't even know what happened after that, because I didn't have a skeleton and I should have died, but the ghosts said I wouldn't, so I guess I just grew a new skeleton? Honestly, I have no idea. I just know that I'm not a boneless pile of mush and I'm still alive."

"So the sister location was shut down and so was Fredbear's," Charlie continued. Years later, it was reopened as Freddy Fazbear's, and Jeremy got a job there. I didn't know what happened to my dad or my one remaining brother after that, but Dad showed up again in that restaurant. He disguised himself as an animatronic using an old springlock suit and killed a bunch of kids. He put them in the Toy animatronics, and since he couldn't put a body in the Marionette, he put it in the its box. Eventually, the Toys were carted off and dumped in the old warehouse, and the bodies were never found."

"The restaurant closed again, but it reopened years later," Mike said. "Nobody would take the job on the night shift, so I did. On the fourth night, Henry somehow got into the pizzeria and attacked Dad. William was in a spare room working on the Toy animatronics and was able to get to him in time. William fired me to keep me safe, and he decided to end Freddy's for good by destroying the animatronics."

"Destroying the vessels of the kids' souls was supposed to free them," Charlie explained, "but they were still tied to the restaurant because they wanted revenge on their killer. They saw William, remembered him from their past lives in the pizzeria, and since their memories were jumbled up, they thought he was the killer. It didn't really help that he had just destroyed their vessels, so they got a little confused and tried to attack him."

Mike nodded. "His daughter's soul in the metal skeleton took over and put their body in the old Spring Bonnie suit. She saw an opportunity to get out of William's body and she took it. Scott was packing up the restaurant at the time and he heard the springlocks snap in Parts and Service. He was able to get William out of the suit, but..." He hesitated. "Uh, William's body was too damaged to survive, but the metal skeleton wasn't, and that was where all the souls were anyway, so..." He shrugged. "William survived, but he had to find a new body if he wanted to- well, _look_ normal... and alive."

"So he did," Charlie said with a disgusted grimace, "and he started going by the name Vincent Graves, because to the rest of the world, William Afton was dead. His daughter's soul had moved from Ennard to Springtrap. Eventually, Fazbear's Fright opened. We still have no idea who opened it, but I got the night shift there during college. Mike was there as an assistant manager/security guard. I was there for the same reason Mike was, to see who had opened the attraction and if there was anything that could be done to free the children."

"Everything was going fine until Charlie's last night," Mike said. "Then Henry showed up. We have no idea how he was able to find us, but he knocked me out and put me in one of the springlock suits. I still don't understand why he didn't just stab me or shoot me or something, because that would have been a lot easier, but I'm not complaining. If he had done that, I'd probably be dead. Anyway, he triggered the springlocks, and I almost died."

"Luckily, I was just heading down to the office to resign and pick up my pay cheque," Charlie continued. "I found him and got him out of the suit and to a hospital before he could die. The next day, the attraction burnt down. We don't know how, but we think it was my dad. He died in the fire, but he was able to remain as a ghost. He was a murderer, so he wouldn't be able to leave the places he was connected to until he made up for what he'd done or the kids he killed either got revenge or forgave him."

"And in return, the kids couldn't leave until Henry was gone, so they had to forgive him or get revenge," Mike explained. "They didn't want to forgive him, and they couldn't get revenge, so they were all stuck there."

Charlie sighed. "I moved away, but I heard of the pizzeria being rebuilt. I knew William had something to do with it, so I moved back here." She shrugged. "And that's the end of it."

Fritz furrowed his brow. "But why couldn't you tell us this before?"

"Because Henry was keeping tabs on me, Mike, Scott, and William," Charlie answered. "He didn't want anyone knowing what was really going on, because he liked messing with people." Charlie pursed her lips. "I know he's my dad, but I'm actually kind of glad he's gone."

Everyone was quiet for a moment. Then Raina spoke up. "I have a question," she said quietly.

"What is it?" Mike sat forward.

"Why did you tell us this?"

Mike and Charlie exchanged a glance. "Well," Mike began, "a lot of people thought that William was the killer. Even if we can never let anyone else know, at least we can tell you."

Everyone went quiet. They all looked at each other. In that moment, they all made a silent promise; they would remember William for who he was, not for who everyone else thought he was. The rest of the world would never know what really happened, but the six of them would.

And that would have to be enough.

 ** _BAD ENDING_**


	49. Good Ending: Part 1

**ShoutOuts: None. (I think. If I did miss any reviews, I apologize.)**

 **Good Ending: Part 1**

 ***Following the events of Chapter 45***

Raina sat down at her table at home. She didn't have work at the pizzeria today, which was good, because everybody there was starting to freak her out. They kept jumping at small sounds and looking around as though someone were following them. It was pretty unnerving.

Although she couldn't blame them. She was just as worried and distracted as they were. There was definitely something going on. She just didn't know what it was.

She set a glass of water down on the table. Then she dug her sketchbook out of her tote bag and put it on the other side of her sewing machine. She was just about to put her phone on the table, then she realized that she was about to put it next to the glass of water. Sirius tended to knock over her water and get her phone wet, so she put it on the other side of her sewing machine with her sketchbook. She glanced up at her wall, where Zoe's picture of her hung. She smiled. The picture depicted Zoe as much as it did her. It was roughly drawn, with black scratches in pencil crayon sticking out of the picture, smudges decorating the paper where her hand went over the coloured pencil lead. It described Zoe perfectly, messy and disorganized.

Raina shook her head, clearing out her thoughts of Zoe. She had a lot of work to do. She grabbed some dark blue fabric from a box next to her table and got to work drawing shapes and patterns where she would have to cut it to make her new outfits.

She heard a quiet meowing and looked down. Her orange tabby cat, Sirius Percival Wilmington III, was looking up at her with big blue eyes.

She sighed. "Sorry Sirius, I'm busy. I have to get this done." She turned back to her work.

She heard another meow, and her cat suddenly jumped up on the table. He sauntered over to her glass of water and butted it with his head.

"No, Sirius, don't-" She held out a hand to stop him, but he had already pushed over the glass. It tipped over and water splashed over the table and dripped onto the floor.

Raina sighed in frustration. "Seriously?" She looked at Sirius, who had jumped off the table and strolled away with his tail high in the air.

She sighed and stood up to get a towel. "Glad I didn't put my phone there," she muttered, grabbing a tea towel from her kitchen. She quickly wiped up Sirius's mess and got back to working on her outfits.

She didn't know how many minutes had passed when she heard her phone vibrate. She glanced up at the clock. She had already been working for an hour? She'd been so absorbed her work that she lost track of time. She grabbed her phone and looked at the text Zoe had sent her.

 _From: Supernova  
_ _hey rnbw. mngle ripped his coat and we were wndering if u could come over and fix it. evryne here is bad at sewing lol_

Raina cringed at Zoe's use of incorrect grammar, unnecessary abbreviations, and lack of vowels. "I swear, she texts like a teenager," Raina sighed as she typed out a response (using proper grammar, spelling, and vowels, of course).

 _To: Supernova  
Sure. I'll be there in ten minutes._

She hesitated, then set an extra text.

 _To: Supernova  
_ _I love you._

She waited, and another text popped up.

 _From: Supernova  
_ _love u 2 :3_

Raina smiled and packed her sewing kit into her tote bag.

 ** _xXx_**

Raina opened the door of the pizzeria and stepped inside. It was 3:15, so everyone was on break. She spotted Zoe leaning against the stage, munching on a piece of pizza. She appeared to be calm and relaxed, but Raina knew better. She saw the slight tenseness in Zoe's shoulders and she kept glancing around, as though waiting for someone to attack her. She saw Raina and seemed to relax a little. "Raina! Thanks for coming by," she said, walking up to her and giving her a quick kiss. "I'll go get Mangle." She ate the last bite of her pizza and ran off to Pirate's Cove.

Raina sat down at one of the tables and unpacked her sewing kit. Zoe came back a moment later, both Mangle and Foxy in tow. For the past few days, no one had gone around the restaurant alone. Even Vincent made it a point to never leave the dining room without someone else accompanying him.

Mangle took off his coat and held it out to Zoe. She took it from him and set it on the table in front of Raina. Mangle and Foxy glanced nervously at the needles in Raina's pincushion and quickly scampered off.

Raina blinked in surprise as she watched them leave. "Alright. Bye then."

Zoe shrugged and sat down across from Raina. "You can't really blame them. Everyone's been on edge lately."

Raina nodded. "Yeah, I get it." She located the rip in the arm of Mangle's coat and plucked a needle out of her pincushion. She took a spool of white thread from her kit and threaded the needle. She scooched her chair closer to the table, ready to repair the jacket, and accidentally kicked something under the table. She pushed her chair back out and crouched down.

"What is it?" Zoe asked, leaning over the table to see.

Raina came back up, a ring with a bunch of keys dangling from it in her hands. "I think somebody lost their keys," She said, sitting back down on her chair.

"Is there a name on it?" Zoe wondered, walking around the table to Raina.

"Yeah, I think so," Raina answered, squinting at the engraved script on one of the keys. It was in cursive, so it was difficult to read. "Vin... cent... Gr...aves. Vincent Graves." She looked up at Zoe. "They're Vincent's."

Zoe took the keys from her. "I'll take these to him while you work on Mangle's jacket."

Raina nodded. "Sure thing." She bent her head down to the table and got to work.

 ** _xXx_**

 ***10:00 p.m.***

Goldie sat down on his bed. Nobody else had gone to sleep yet, but for whatever reason, he was really tired. He felt like he hadn't slept in days. He had already changed into his pyjamas and was just about to go to bed.

The door suddenly opened and Mari walked in, still dressed in a t-shirt and jeans. She was rubbing her eyes and yawning, which was weird, because they weren't programmed to show signs of exhaustion. They weren't even supposed to get tired.

"Hey Mari," he said warily. "Going to bed already?"

She nodded. "Yeah. I feel like I haven't been charged in days." She lay down on her bed and closed her eyes as soon as her head hit the pillow, not bothering to pull the covers over her.

The door opened again and Springtrap entered with Freddy. They were both still wearing their work clothes, and they barely acknowledged Goldie as they flopped onto their beds and fell asleep.

Goldie stared at them. This was weird. Why was everybody so tired all of a sudden?

Chica walked in, wearing her own pyjamas. "Hey Goldie," she greeted. "What's wrong?" she asked when she saw the concerned look on his face.

He shrugged. "I don't know. I just think it's weird that everybody's so tired all of a sudden."

Chica nodded. "Yeah. I don't know what's going on." She swallowed nervously. "But I think we're about to find out." She turned off the light and lay down in her bed.

Goldie sighed. She was right. Something was going to happen, and it was going to happen soon.

He lay down on his side and closed his eyes.

 ** _xXx_**

 _Goldie was trapped inside a small, dark room. He was facing the door, so he turned around to look at the rest of the room. There was an empty animatronic costume slumped against the wall, and shelves full of animatronic heads and endoskeleton pieces hung on one wall. The dark shadows in the room made them look like human skulls. He heard a deep, rumbling laugh coming from somewhere, and he began crying. He couldn't help it. He was terrified._

 _He turned back to the door. "Please let me out," he begged, hoping against hope that someone, anyone, would be able to hear him._

 _The door stayed closed. He began sobbing harder, terrified of the dead-looking things behind him. "PLEASE!" he shouted, hitting the door with his tiny hands. He turned and looked at the things, wanting to get as far away from them as he possibly could. He collapsed in a fit of sobs, curling up on the floor. "Please let me out..." he choked, in one last attempt for someone to hear him. Everything slowly faded to blackness, and suddenly, he was in the dining room in the restaurant. The picture of the yellow bear was on the wall like usual, but it wasn't speaking to him now. He was surrounded by four taller people, each of them wearing a different mask. There was the boy with the red fox mask, two others with a purple rabbit mask and a brown bear mask, and one girl with a yellow- was that a duck? No, it was a chicken. Chica the Chicken, the animatronic. So the fox must have been Foxy, the bunny was Bonnie, and the bear was Freddy._

 _"Wow, your brother is kind of a baby, isn't he?" Bonnie sneered._

 _"It's hilarious," Foxy chuckled. "Why don't we help him get a closer look? He'll love it!"_

 _Goldie didn't know what they were talking about, but he was sure he didn't want to find out. "No! Please!" he cried._

 _"Come on guys, let's give this little man a lift," Foxy said. "He wants to get up close and personal!"_

 _Suddenly, he felt Foxy and the kid with the Bonnie mask lift him up under the arms, the other two following behind and laughing._

 _"No!" Goldie shouted. "I don't want to go!"_

 _"You heard the little man!" Foxy cackled. "He wants to get even closer!" The other three laughed in response._

 _They reached the stage with the yellow animatronic bear and rabbit. The two robots had stopped singing and dancing, almost as if they were waiting to see what was going to happen._

 _Foxy snickered. "Hey guys, I think the little man said he wants to give Fredbear a big kiss!" He and Bonnie held Goldie up higher. "On three! One... two... THREE!" They hoisted Goldie up and shoved him into the animatronic's open mouth so only his legs were sticking out._

 _Goldie shrieked and flailed around in a panic, trying to get himself out of the bear's mouth. He felt the animatronic's jaws tighten around him, and he wiggled even more, trying to work himself loose. His torso was mostly out now, and he almost had his head loose, when suddenly-_

 _SNAP._

 _His head was filled with unbearable pain as the bear's jaws closed on his head, crushing his skull and everything inside it. The laughs of the four people behind him stopped abruptly, as though horrified at what they had done. Then all the sounds started fading, and his vision went black. He was losing consciousness, and he welcomed the darkness, letting it take away the horrible, horrible pain in his head._

 _Now he was sitting in a black room that was painted so dark he could barely see. The yellow bear plushie was sitting there with him, along with the other four plushes from his room. There was beautiful music coming from somewhere, but he couldn't figure out where._

 _"_ Can you hear me? _" the fox plushie asked, its voice echoing through the room. "_ I don't know if you can hear me. _" It paused for a moment. "_ I'm sorry, _" it apologized sadly._

 _"_ You're broken _." The golden plushie said. Behind him, the red headless fox melted into the darkness. "_ We are still your friends _." The chicken faded as well. "_ Do you still believe that? _" Now the bunny disappeared. "_ I'm still here. _" The brown bear faded too. "_ I will put you back together _." And finally, the golden bear slowly disappeared, the darkness folding around it like a blanket, until it was gone._

 _He felt the darkness loom up behind him. It washed over him like water, and he sat there and let it. His heart slowed to a dull thumping that throbbed every few seconds, until it eventually stopped. His vision darkened one last time, and he could faintly hear the sound of the sound of a heart monitor flatlining._

Goldie and Chica both woke with a start. One by one, each of the other animatronics woke up as memories flooded back into their minds.

 ** _xXx_**

 ***12:00 a.m.***

Zoe was sitting at her kitchen counter, staring down at the blueprints for the new animatronics. She hadn't made any progress on them for the past few days. Try as she might, she just couldn't focus.

She sighed and stood up. There was an odd feeling in her gut. Something felt... wrong. She just didn't know what.

She put her head in her hands and took a deep breath. Maybe she just needed to take a walk. She grabbed her coat and stood up. She didn't bother to lock her door behind her. She hopefully wouldn't be out for long.

As she walked, the feeling in her gut grew more insistent. After a few minutes, she realized that she was walking down the same street she usually took to get to the pizzeria. She hadn't really had a destination in mind, but maybe this was a good thing. Maybe going here would give her the inspiration she needed to finish those blueprints.

She turned onto the street where the pizzeria resided, and then she saw just what was wrong.

The animatronics were all walking through the doors of the restaurant, looking for all the world like zombies freshly risen from the grave. They slowly lurched into the pizzeria, tripping over each other and bumping into the doors.

She heard footsteps and turned around to see Mike running down the sidewalk towards her. "Zoe!" he called. "What's going on?"

She gestured to the robots. "I don't know! I just came here and saw this!"

"Hey guys!" Zoe and Mike whirled their heads around to see Jeremy running up to them, dressed in pyjama pants and a t-shirt. "What are you doing here?"

Zoe pointed to the pizzeria. "That's what we're doing here!"

His eyes widened. "What the-?"

He was interrupted when a bright blue car pulled up and parked at the sidewalk. Charlie opened the door and hopped out. She saw the animatronics and gasped. "What's going on?"

"We don't know!" Jeremy shouted, obviously panicked.

"What the heck?" Raina's voice yelled. She ran up behind Zoe and stopped beside her. "What are they doing here?"

"Wait!" another voice yelled. Zoe looked up and saw Vincent sprinting towards them, the two baby animatronics hanging onto his legs, the ballerinas clinging to his shirt, and the bunny peeking out from under his hat. For whatever reason, there was a Jack Russel Terrier running beside him, barking excitedly.

"William?" Mike exclaimed in surprise. "What are you doing here?"

"William?" Jeremy asked. "Who's William?"

"I'll explain later," Vincent said. He didn't even seem to be out of breath. "Right now, we need to get into the pizzeria and stop them from getting to Fritz and Scott."

"Why would they be after Fritz and Scott?" Raina asked.

"I said I'll explain later!" Vincent yelled as he dashed towards the restaurant. The animatronics were already inside, and they seemed to have locked the doors behind them.

Raina and Jeremy exchanged a confused glance. Neither of them knew what was going on. Who was William? Why were there little robots all over Vincent? And why did he have a dog? They both shrugged and ran after him. He seemed to know what he was doing, so they figured that following him was probably their best bet.

Zoe was also confused, but slightly less so. She was also a little unsure about why there was a dog here, but she chose to ignore it and just try her best. She ran after Vincent without hesitation.

Mike and Charlie looked at each other from across the street. They knew exactly what was happening. The ghosts had woken up, and now they were looking for revenge. If they saw William, they would go after him. The children didn't know who was really behind all this. They both dashed after the others towards the restaurant.

The others reached Vincent to see him trying to yank the doors open. "Damn it," he muttered. "They must have locked the doors." He looked up. He could see the animatronics inside, slowly making their way to the hallway. There were two shapes darting in and out of the mass of metal bodies. It was Chica and Goldie, both of them grabbing the arms of their friends and trying to pull them away, shouting and pleading for them to go back to the house. Vincent quickly tore his gaze away from them and reached into his pocket for his keys. He brought them out and jammed one of them in the keyhole. He tried turning it, but the lock seemed to be stuck. He groaned in annoyance. Are you kidding me? I just oiled this thing!" He yanked the key out of the slot and shoved his keyring back in his pocket.

Vincent looked up at the animatronics, who were just walking past the Show Stage and were just about at the hallway. Chica and Goldie seemed to be slowing them down a bit, but they would eventually be overpowered. He sighed, as though regretting what he was about to do. "Alright. Plan B." He backed away from the doors. "If any of you are squeamish about blood, you might want to look away," he warned. He looked down at his feet, where the two Bidybabs were still clinging to his legs. "You two are going to have to keep me in check, make sure the others don't come out and try to kill anybody."

He heard a sad whine from above him and looked upwards at BonBon. "I'm sorry buddy. I know you want to see your old friend, but you know how dangerous he is." Vincent looked back down at the doors.

What happened next was so weird, Raina still had a hard time believing that it had actually happened. A large gash seemingly appeared out of nowhere on his arm. His hand went limp and lost its shape, like a balloon deflating, and from the gash, a metal hand-looking thing emerged. He stepped back from the door and reared his arm back, the metal hand curled in a fist as though ready to punch it. Then he actually did punch it, all the strength in his body concentrated into one hard strike. The doors burst open, crashing into the walls inside the building and swinging shut. Mike shoved his foot into the opening before they could close completely.

The animatronics all suddenly whirled around at the noise, staring at them with blank, dead eyes.

"Holy _fuck!_ " Vincent yelled, clutching his metal hand with his normal one. "Shit, that _hurts!_ " The was a line of blood on his shirt where his shoulder blade was. The shirt was torn there, and a large disk of metal was sticking out of his back.

"What the heck is that?" Zoe asked, staring at the metal disk. She leaned in and studied the metal. "So, is your entire skeleton made of metal? Or is that just a prosthetic arm covered in some kind of fleshy rubber silicone?" She moved to his side so she could see his metal hand. "That's fascinating. How does it work?"

"Could you stop staring at me?" he said. As he spoke, the metal hand folded itself back into his skin, and the metal disk that was forced through his back retreated back into his body. He felt little needles poke through his skin, sewing the wounds closed. "It's making me uncomfortable."

Zoe backed away, sounding slightly disappointed. "Okay. Sorry." She looked up into the restaurant. The animatronics were still staring at them, their gears whiring as they processed what they were seeing. Then they all started walking towards the group, their bright eyes illuminating the dark room. They started moving faster, bordering on normal walking. Chica and Goldie seemed to notice this and started pushing tables in front of the advancing robots, trying to close them in so they couldn't do any harm. Unfortunately, the animatronics began crawling over the tables with ease. They were obviously getting used to their forms, as they began walking faster without tripping over each other.

And they were all glaring straight at Vincent.

The Minireenas crawled over his shoulders and cowered on his back, shaking with fear. The Bidybabs peered out at the approaching robots from behind Vincent's legs, talking to each other with hushed voices. Bonbon pushed his hat up to look. He immediately let out a terrified squeak and lowered the hat again.

"William, you should leave," Mike said, stepping in front of the doors.

"No." Vincent moved forward and stood next to him. "I started all of this in the first place, and I'm not leaving until I've fixed it."

Mike turned at look at him. "You didn't start this William, you know who really-"

"But they don't know that!" Vincent yelled, gesturing at the rapidly approaching animatronics. "I don't care who started this, I'm fucking finishing it!"

Charlie stepped forward and put a hand on Vincent's shoulder. "Well, don't think you're doing it without us."

Vincent stared at her for a moment. He looked behind him at Jeremy, Raina, and Zoe. They all looked a little confused and a lot scared, but they were all looking at him with the same determined expression.

He took a deep breath. "Okay. Here we go then."


	50. Good Ending: Part 2

**ShoutOuts: OrangyGinger (well, here's the next part of the Good Ending! You might have to wait a bit longer than usual for the last part though, because instead of just having to add things onto the Bad Ending, I'm going to have to rewrite it completely. It will be out eventually though, so don't worry!)**

 **Good Ending: Part 2**

Chica was freaking out.

She had no idea what was going on. All of a sudden, all of the other animatronics had just woken up and left the house. For whatever reason, a lot of their metal were different colours. Bonnie was completely purple, Foxy was dark red, and Teddy was a vibrant orange. Everybody else's metal was slowly changing into different colours, and she guessed that those three had just started changing earlier. Holes suddenly appeared in their metal too, revealing the silver endoskeletons beneath. Balloon Boy and Freddy still had the same skin colour they had before, except BB's nose was now a darker pink and Freddy's metal was just a slightly lighter shade of brown than normal. They were all changing to look more like the original animatronics.

Chica glanced down at her own body in her flannel pyjamas. If everyone was changing, why weren't she and Goldie both bright yellow by now?

"Chica!" Goldie's voice yelled. She whirled arond to see him trying his best to keep Springtrap away from the now open doors. She seemed the most determined to reach William out of all of them. Goldie pointed, and Chica followed his gaze to Foxy, who was running remarkably fast at the others outside the doors. Chica panicked and picked up the first thing she saw, which happened to be Bonnie's guitar, and threw it at him with all her strength. It hit him in the back and he went down with a loud crash.

Chica looked up at the doors and saw William talking to the others. Maybe he was laying out a plan. Maybe he knew what he was doing and knew how to stop this.

Then four small ballerina-looking animatronics suddenly dashed into the restaurant on all fours, Zoe following behind. The other animatronics saw her and began running after her, but Mike ran in and body-checked two of them into the Prize Corner counter. They started going after him instead, but Charlie dashed in and tackled them. When they started going after her, Jeremy and Raina ran in and started pushing the robots away from them. Each of them tied their best to keep the animatronics away from each other.

William ran in, two odd-looking baby robots clinging to his legs and a dog running behind him. Zoe and the other little robots had already disappeared down the hallway, and William followed after them, gesturing for Chica and Goldie to follow. The two sane robots exchanged a glance, then shrugged and ran after him.

They sprinted down the hallway and saw William standing in the open doorway of the Parts and Service room. He waved them inside and shut the door. Zoe and Fritz were inside, both of them standing around the control panel and frantically hitting buttons in a seemingly random order. The ballerinas were sitting on top of the panel, randomly playing with the dials and switches as though that might help. Scott was there too, leaning against the panel and watching the other two at work.

Goldie took a deep breath. "Okay. What the fuck is going on?"

"Watch your language," Zoe said automatically.

"Fritz and I came in here as soon as we heard you guys come in," Scott said. "We've been trying to activate that emergency shut-down thing that Zoe and Fritz made, but for whatever reason, it's not working."

Fritz growled in frustration and shut his laptop. "Why isn't this working? I've entered the password at least fifty times!"

Zoe sighed and sat down in one of the chairs. "I'm trying mine. It's not working either."

"Well, we need to do something!" William exploded. "The others are eventually going to get overwhelmed, and the animatronics will come this way, and if they find me, they'll find you, and then we're all dead!" He sat down in the other chair and put his head in his hands.

"We'll figure out something," Chica insisted. "We'll get out of here." She had to admit, the odds did not seem to be in their favour. But she had to stay hopeful.

Suddenly, she heard a faint laugh from the corner of the room. She and Goldie both whirled around to see what it was. There was a human-looking thing standing there, leaning against the wall and observing them with an amused look on its face. It was slightly transparent, and Chica could see the checkered wallpaper pattern through its body. It had a toolbox in one hand and was wearing a purple security guard uniform. It saw her staring and laughed again. It turned away, and to her surprise, walked straight through the wall.

She glanced at Goldie. They were both confused and a little scared. What was that thing?

She turned back to the others and saw William gazing at the spot where the thing had disappeared, his eyes wide with fear. He had obviously seen the thing as well. So why hadn't the other three?

Zoe suddenly raised an arm and slammed her fist down on the control panel. "Fuck! Why isn't this working?"

Scott moved so he was standing behind the control panel with her and Fritz. "Don't worry, I'm sure we can figure this out." His dog barked and put his front paws on the control panel.

William stared at them for a moment. The animatronics would soon overpower the others, and then they would come for him. And if they found him, they would find Scott, Zoe, and Fritz. He looked behind him at Chica and Goldie. They looked back at him with determined expressions on their faces. Although the three of them had never been close, each of them knew what the other two were thinking. Within seconds, they had a plan. It wasn't a very good plan, and it might cost them their lives, but it was their only option.

Zoe sighed in frustration and typed her password into the control panel again. It beeped and the words "INCORRECT PASSWORD" appeared on the small screen. Why wasn't it working? She was one hundred percent sure that she had typed in the right password.

Goldie and Chica suddenly grabbed Zoe's and Fritz's hands and dragged them over to the door. Vincent knelt and began crawling around, as though he was looking for something.

Scott walked over to the doors with Zoe and Fritz, his dog following after him. "What's going on?"

"You're getting out of here is what's going on," Vincent answered from the floor. When he stood up, he had something in his hands. Zoe craned her neck to see it, but Chica and Goldie pushed her out the door before she saw what it was.

"William, what-" Scott started, but he was interrupted when Goldie grabbed his hand and yanked him through the doorway. The dog barked and ran out with him, tail wagging.

"What are you doing?" Fritz asked nervously as Chica and Goldie pulled him down the corridor.

"Less talking, more walking," Goldie quipped, and started pushing Fritz more urgently.

Zoe exchanged a glance with Fritz and Scott. They all shrugged and began running with the two animatronics. They got to the dining room and saw Mike, Charlie, Jeremy, and Raina struggling with keeping the other robots at bay. Raina had a bloody gash on her forehead, accompanied by multiple bruises. Jeremy had a black eye and the sleeve of his shirt was soaked with blood. Mike and Charlie seemed to be mostly okay, but they were obviously getting tired and couldn't hold out much longer.

"Guys!" Chica waved her arms to get their attention. "We're getting out of here!"

The four of them immediately stepped away from the robots. "Where's William?" Mike asked as they ran over to the others.

"He'll take care of it," Goldie replied, pushing Mike over to the doors. "Just go!" Upon hearing Goldie's voice, Foxy suddenly whipped around to look at him. The enraged expression on Foxy's face immediately softened. He started running towards Goldie, who just looked at him sadly and continued pushing the others to the exit.

They got to the doors and Zoe felt Chica push her out. She turned around, fully expecting to see Chica and Goldie come out with them and close the doors behind them. Instead, she watched as they slammed the doors while they were still in the restaurant and shoved Bonnie's guitar through the handles so it couldn't be opened from the outside.

"Hey!" Jeremy yelled. "What are you doing? Open up!"

Goldie and Chica just looked back at them sadly. Then they turned and ran back towards the hall.

Charlie smacked her palm against the glass. "Michael Brooks, you get back here right now and open up this door!" She sounded like she was about to start crying.

Mike grabbed her wrist and pulled her away from the door. "Leave them, Charlie. They're already gone."

Charlie stared through the glass, tears streaming down her face. There was nothing they could do.

Meanwhile, Vincent was having problems of his own.

He heard Chica and Goldie shut the doors and Charlie's anguished cries from outside the pizzeria. Hearing that broke his heart, but he was just doing what had to be done.

He finished splashing gasoline over the floor and desk of the security guard office and then moved down the hallway to the party rooms. Goldie and Chica had to be here to keep the other animatronics from going after Vincent while he did his job, and Vincent he had to keep them distracted long enough so Chica and Goldie could get out through the back door in his room. Then he would get out and send the place up in flames. If the emergency button wasn't working, then this was the only way to dispose of all the robots at once.

He glanced down the hall. He had known all of the children before they had died. Sure, Bonnie, Freddy, and Chica had all had a hand in Michael's death, and Foxy had been the ringleader of their little group and a horrible brother to Michael, but that didn't mean they had to die for it. BB had been the youngest when he died, only four years old, and he had been the only one who could talk to Mari, the shy aspiring actor who always hung around the back of the restaurant. Teddy, Tonnie, and Tia were always running around, jumping in the ball pit one minute and stuffing cake in their faces the next. And Springtrap...

Vincent's heart clenched. He'd doubted it at first, but when he had glimpsed one of her drawings over her shoulder one day at the pizzeria, he was certain.

He heard Chica yell from the dining room, and he picked up the pace. Those two wouldn't be able to keep the robots at bay for long.

He finished with the party rooms and ran down the hall, flammable liquid trailing behind him, muttering curses under his breath. He'd been lost in thought for too long, and now he was running out of time. He would have to make this quick.

He dashed into the dining room and began dousing everything in gasoline as he ran. The animatronics shrieked when they saw him, and many of them were able to break away from Chica and Goldie. The other three spirits inside him stirred, as though they were going to burst if they didn't get out soon. He couuld empathize with them. He wanted out just as much as they did, but not before he finished his job.

Vincent darted around the animatronics, making sure to splash some gasoline on them as he passed. The robots missed every time they tried to hit him, as they were so ungulfed with rage that they probably weren't seeing straight. Chica and Goldie were still struggling to hold back the few that they had a hold on, but there was one animatronic that wasn't even doing anything. She was just standing there, staring at him.

Vincent faltered. He'd seen Zoe's blueprints for the robots before they were made, and he knew that Springtrap wasn't supposed to have green eyes, she was supposed to have brown ones. Yet here she was, her gazing eyes a bright, almost glowing green. She slowly stepped away from Goldie, who tried to grab her arm and pull her back, but she shrugged his hand off effortlessly.

Vincent shook his head and ducked as soon as Tia's fist swung over him in the space that his head had been moments before. He had to focus on his task.

He had mostly covered the dining room and figured that would have to be enough. He sinaled to Chica and Goldie and they broke away from the animatronics and started back down the hallway. On the way down the corridor, he caught sight of the Bidybabs, the Minireenas, and Bonbon. He had left them in Parts and Service, but they must have sneaked out when they heard him running. He looked at them sadly. He hated to leave them here to burn. Sure, they had gotten a lot better since they'd been away from _him_ , but he couldn't take any chances.

Then he heard a voice that stopped him in his tracks.

"Father?"

Chica and Goldie noticed him stop and looked behind them. "William!" Chica said, panicked. "Come on! We have to go!"

The voice came again. "Father? I know it's you."

He turned slowly. Springtrap was standing there at the entrance of the hallway, staring at him with those bright eyes. The other animatronics were standing behind her, standing absolutely still as though they were waiting for something. "Hello, Father," she said, her normal voiced replaced with a little girl's in a British accent. Oh, how he missed his own accent! He used to sound so elegant. Now he sounded _American_. Ugh.

Springtrap almost seemed to know what he was thinking, because then she giggled. "I know, right? I've never heard an American accent before now. They're very interesting, aren't they?"

He took a step back. "How did you do that?"

She smiled at him sadly. "I have a friend, Father. He did it. He told me what you were thinking." Her smile faltered. "He told me what you did. Why did you do that?"

He shook his head and stepped back again. "I didn't do anything. He did it. He's lying to you." As he said it, the words in his mouth felt fake, like he was the one who was lying. But he was telling the truth, wasn't he? He hadn't killed any of the kids! He'd cared about each and every one of them, even Michael's nasty older brother.

He felt Goldie's hand tugging on his wrist. "Come on, William, we don't have much time!"

"Father, don't listen to him." Springtrap took a step forwards. "Michael just doesn't want to die again. Only thinking of himself, as usual."

"That's not true!" Chica's voice yelled, but Vincent barely heard her. As Springtrap spoke, memories surfaced from the depths of his mind; tinkering with the animatronics for the sister location, warning his daughter to stay away from the sister location robots, glaring angrily at the kids in the restaurant while one hand rested on a knife on one of the tables. The three other spirits in his mind yelled at him, telling him that those memories were taken out of context, shown to him right now to make him panic. He though this odd, as those three ghosts had never liked him much and had always fought him for control over their body. But now they were trying to _help_ him, and he believed them too; he just didn't know why Springtrap wanted him to think he was the murderer.

He glanced around. Something had to be manipulating his memories. Logically, it didn't make any sense, as no one could go into other people's minds and change their memories. Well, no one _alive_ anyway.

Then he saw it. The ghost with the toolbox from the Parts and Service room flickered into existence next to Springtrap, whose eyes glowed brighter in it's presence. It smirked at Vincent and laughed silently before fading away again.

"It's him," Goldie whispered. He, Chica, and Vincent all exchanged a glance. The ghost was connected to Springtrap's soul. As long as its vessel, the animatronic, was still intact, there would be no getting rid of this thing. They still had to get out of the pizzeria so they could light the fire and burn the robots down.

Vincent quickly swung the half-empty gasoline can at Springtrap's head, and Chica and Goldie took off down the hall. The gasoline can hit Spring square in the face and she tumbled backwards, landing on her back. "OW!" she yelled, and he heard another voice layered underneath hers, a deep, gruff voice that sounded very angry. Vincent immediately dropped the can and dashed down the hallway. He heard the angry ghost's voice yell "GET THEM!" and Springtrap's voice managing to yell "Father, run!" before the ghost regained control over her. The footsteps of the animatronics echoed throughout the pizzeria, but none of them seemed to be getting any closer. All of them had probably tried to get into the hallway at once, and were now squished in the narrow corridor, trying to squeeze their way through.

Vincent reached Chica and Goldie at the door to his room. They were both desperately pushing on it, but the door wouldn't swing open. The Bidybabs and Minireenas were trying to help as well, and Bonbon was doing his best with the little grip he could get on it with no legs or feet to push off the floor with, but they didn't seem to be having any luck.

Chica heard Vincent and turned around. "It's locked!" she yelled in a panic.

Vincent glanced behind him. Springtrap was slowly stumbling down the corridor, clumsily crashing into the walls as she went, but it wouldn't take long for her to reach them. He heard a _crash_ as the other animatronics spilled into the hallway.

Goldie looked at Vincent and held out his hand. "I need your keys!"

Vincent frantically dug in his pockets for his keys. He fished them out of his pocket and tossed them to Goldie. He caught them and selected the one for Vincent's door. He was just about to insert it into the slot when Foxy suddenly sprinted past Vincent and tackled Goldie at the knees. The keys flew from his hands as he crashed to the floor.

"Goldie!" Chica shrieked. She started towards him, but suddenly, there were the Bidybabs, Minireenas, and Bonbon, tugging on her pyjama pants, trying to keep her away from Goldie and Foxy. Trying to keep her safe.

Vincent looked behind him. The rest of the animatronics were advancing quicker now, and they would be on them in a few seconds. He could try to save Goldie and doom them all in the process, or he could open the door and get Chica out.

Chica stopped struggling against the tiny robots and looked at Goldie. She had come to the same conclusion as William. They were both staring at Goldie as Foxy repeatedly slashed at him with his hook. Goldie was looking back at them, a determined expression on his face.

Chica exchanged a quick glance with both William and Goldie. They all knew what they needed to do. It was killing them, but they had to. In one second, with one look, the three of them made up their minds.

Goldie struggled and yanked his arm out from under Foxy. He held out his hand. William took his cigarette lighter from his pocket and threw it to him. Chica swiftly scooped up William's keys from the floor and jammed one of them in the slot. She turned it, and the door swung open. She waved the tiny animatronics inside and looked up. "William!"

He tore his eyes away from Goldie and ran to the door. The both of them stared back at Goldie for a moment. He shot them a sad smile. "Go!" he yelled, still trying to dodge Foxy's furious attacks.

Chica felt herself tear up. She didn't want to leave him, and she knew William didn't want to either, but they had no choice. The two of them ran through William's room to the back exit, the Bidybabs, Minireenas, and Bonbon following close behind. They heard Goldie's voice, both triumphant and smug, yelling "EAT THIS, DAD!" before the building went up in flames.


	51. Good Ending: Part 3

**ShoutOuts: OrangyGinger (thanks! And I guess you didn't have to wait for as long as I thought you would for this chapter, because I was just really excited to write it :) ), MagicMakerRose (THANK U), and luiginaryworker553 (YES AGAIN).**

 **Good Ending: Part 3**

 ***One week later***

The inferno had only lasted for five minutes before the fire department showed up. Charlie had called the police as soon as Goldie ran back into the restaurant, and minutes later, the fire started. Mike called the fire department after that, but the building had already burned down by the time they arrived. After they searched the building, they confirmed that no one had died in the fire.

But that didn't explain where Vincent had gone. Chica had run out of the restaurant after the fire started, the Bidybabs, Minireenas, and Bonbon following behind her. She ran over to the rest of them, and she seemed surprised when she realized that Vincent hadn't followed her out.

The next week was a blur. Mike, Fritz, and Jeremy had to find new jobs, and Raina and Zoe went back to their old routines of running their shops. Charlie's life didn't change much, as she didn't have a job at the pizzeria before. Scott decided to go into retirement and spent most of his time at home. Vincent's little animatronics had decided to live with Scott, and Chica had moved into Zoe's guest room.

Zoe couldn't sleep for most of that week. She knew the animatronics had only been metal things with A.I.s, but she couldn't help but feel how she did when Travis ran away with Jesse, like she lost a child. But this felt ten times worse. She hadn't even known Jesse for all that long before they were taken away, but the animatronics had had personality. She had cared about all of them, and now they were gone, burnt to a crisp, and there would be no funeral for them. Yeah, maybe it was silly, caring about robots like they were her kids, but she couldn't help it. But at least one of them had survived.

Vincent's funeral came around, and it passed by quietly. Aside from Charlie, Mike, Jeremy, Raina, Zoe, and Scott, barely anyone had shown up. There were quite a few people there. There were a lot of adults and their children, but that didn't even come close to the amount of fangirls who showed up. A lot of the people there people didn't even seem sad. Word had got around about Vincent's body never being found, and many people were whispering to each other during the service.

"I think he's still alive," one girl muttered to her friend.

"I heard he set the fire because he wanted to kill his employees," her friend murmured back.

"Shut up," another girl whispered harshly. "If he's actually dead, do you really think his family would want people to remember him as a murderer?"

"What family?" the first girl quipped. "We've been here since the funeral started, and we haven't seen anyone who looks like him even a little bit. No one cares if we think he's a murderer."

Then the funeral was over, and Zoe, Raina, and Chica were in Zoe's truck. Raina was driving to Zoe's house when she turned down a different street. Zoe looked over at her. "Where are we going?"

"Mike and Charlie asked to meet us," she answered. She took her eyes off the road for a moment to look at Zoe. "I hope that's okay with you. You can always take the truck and pick me up later."

Zoe shook her head. "No, it's okay. I think we should see them."

They pulled up to a house and Raina stopped the truck on the curb. There were already three other vehicles parked along the street. She recognized Fritz's grey minivan, Jeremy's silver convertible, and Charlie's little blue car (and horrendous parking job). Mike's red truck was parked in the open garage. They hopped out of Zoe's truck and walked up the driveway to the house.

Mike opened the door, still in his suit from the funeral. "Hey guys," he greeted. "Glad you made it."

"Thanks for inviting us," Zoe replied. She looked around the room. Jeremy was sitting in the armchair, staring at the floor and looking lost in thought. Fritz was sitting cross-legged on the floor, a can of pop forgotten on the coffee table. Charlie was on the couch, her hands shoved in the pockets of her suit jacket, leaning back and staring through the window as though the answers to all her questions were hidden in the glass.

"Where's Scott?" Raina wondered, asking the question Zoe had been thinking.

Mike shrugged. "I invited him, but I don't think he's going to come." He gestured to the couch. "You guys can sit down if you want. Sorry I don't have much room."

"It's okay," Zoe said as she and Raina sat down on the couch next to Charlie. "So why'd you invite us over?"

"So we can talk," Charlie answered. "We can give you guys a full explanation."

Mike nodded and sat down on the floor in between Fritz and Jeremy. "We were going to get Scott to help explain, but I don't think he's going to show up. I don't think it would be a good idea for him to revisit all this right now anyway."

Chica sat down on the arm of the couch. "Go ahead then. I think we all want to know what happened last week."

Everyone stared at her as she smoothed out her black dress. Over the past week, her metal skin had become less and less shiny and looked a lot more like human skin. Her hair was smoother, almost like real hair. The screws in her joints had been popping out one by one, and now there were only a few left in the more metal-looking parts of her body. No one knew what was happening to her, but they were all confused, Chica more than anyone.

Charlie tore her eyes away from a Chica and took a shaky breath. "Okay. You guys might want to get comfortable. This is going to take a while."

"Wait." Jeremy spoke up before they could begin. "So you're going to explain why the animatronics went haywire and tried to attack us?"

"Well, that will be part of it," Mike said hesitantly. "This is probably going to answer some questions, but it might be confusing." He looked at Charlie. "Do you want to start?"

Charlie sighed and nodded. "Alright. I'll start with William and my dad." She swallowed nervously. "William Afton and my dad, Henry Brooks, used to own Fredbear's Family Diner together. William dealt with the animatronics and my dad handled the business part of the restaurant, like paying the employees and stuff. Eventually, Dad suggested that they expand the company by creating a rental company for the animatronics. Dad asked William to make some new animatronics. So William made the robots, and I don't really remember them much."

"William brought them to Fredbear's to showcase them," Mike continued. "But although Henry wasn't a mechanic, he had always been fascinated with mechanics and stuff like that, so he decided to tinker with the animatronics and see if he could get them to do the opposite of what they were supposed to do."

"What was that?" Raina asked skeptically.

"Kill people," Charlie answered bitterly. "He wanted to see if he could turn kid-friendly robots into killing machines, and he did it."

"But William saw Henry backstage with the animatronics and became suspicious," Mike explained. "He warned his daughter to stay away from the robots until he could get a look at them, but she-" He stopped and looked down at the floor. "She didn't listen," he said, his voice thick with emotion.

"Eventually, his daughter got away from him and went to play with Circus Baby, the ringleader of the animatronics," Charlie announced. "She was killed. Nobody knew how, and even we don't know, but her body was inside the animatronic after, all folded up and crushed and-" She broke off her sentence and shuddered. "Ugh. Sorry. I'm not describing it. It's too disgusting. Anyway, Dad blamed the death on William, who was taken in for questioning. He was declared innocent and quit working with Henry immediately. All the animatronics were taken and shut away. After that, Dad decided to just pack up and move away. Me and my brothers Michael and Daniel wanted to stay here, but Dad just seemed really eager to leave. Of course, I didn't know why at the time, but I did know that something was up."

"After Henry saw what he could with just one animatronic, he became obsessed with them," Mike continued. "He took the old robots and changed them so they would do horrible things in different situations. But he didn't want some random kid to just go up to them and die. He wanted to see if he could drive someone else to kill someone or themselves with the modified robots. He got an entire warehouse and built an entire environment under it. A restaurant, some small houses, and even an entire street with a sidewalk and everything. He'd gone absolutely mad with power, and started kidnapping people, kids mostly, to live in this underground place."

Charlie swallowed nervously. "I was always Dad's favourite, so I was safe from his experiments. Unfortunately, my brothers weren't. He put Michael on hallucinatory drugs and trapped him in dark rooms where he'd have to fend off imaginary monsters, and he kept talking to this Fredbear plush. Daniel and three others were all injected with some weird drug that made them act really aggressive. They constantly picked on Michael, and they eventually..." Her voice trailed off and she began to cry.

"They killed him," Mike finished quietly. "That was the Bite of '87. They put him in Fredbear's mouth, and the animatronic's jaw snapped shut on his head."

Zoe gaped at him in horror. What kind of man would do that to his own children?

"You guys can leave if you want," Charlie sniffled. "We understand if you don't want to hear anymore."

Zoe looked around, waiting for someone to stand up and leave, but no one did. Even Jeremy was still in his seat, although he was eyeing the door as though debating whether or not to make a break for it.

"Well, I guess we're all okay," Zoe observed. "Continue."

Mike took a deep breath. "Alright. So all of this happened over the course of a few years, and a few years after the Bite, I turned sixteen. I knew that there was something weird going on at this warehouse, so I decided to get a job there. Unfortunately, I had no idea that I had basically just signed up to be a part of Henry's weird experiments. The job was kind of difficult because I had to deal with the modified sister location animatronics, but everything was going pretty okay until my fifth night on the job. Henry had built some kind of machine that would dispose of the bodies in the animatronics he used to kill kids, and-" He paused. "Well, this is going to sound crazy, but a ghost lured me to the machine."

Jeremy raised an eyebrow. "A ghost?" he asked skeptically.

Mike sighed. "I know, it's weird, but Henry only used the machine four times, once for each of the animatronics. Sometimes, he killed a kid with one and didn't take the body out of the robot for years. But he didn't really realize that the kids- well, they weren't really alive exactly, but-" He stopped and turned to Charlie for help.

"The kids' souls kind of used the robots as their vessels," Charlie answered. "They were alive and Henry only modified them to kill children, but the kids started going after Mike, too. William's daughter pretended to help him, but instead she got him to the machine and it..." She trailed off and thogh for a moment.

"It kinda scooped out my skeleton," Mike finished.

Fritz shuddered in disgust. "Eww, that's gross."

"It's even more disgusting if you're the one experiencing it," Mike said.

"But how did you survive?" Raina wondered.

"She promised I wouldn't die," Mike stated. "And when a ghost promises something, it happens, no matter how impossible it usually is."

"But why did she do that?" Zoe asked. "Scoop out your skeleton, I mean."

"They wanted to get out of the warehouse," Charlie explained, "so they all got scooped, formed parts of their vessels into one big skeleton-like robot, and went inside Mike's body so they could leave."

"I felt really sick for the next few weeks, and I kept hearing the ghosts' voices all the time," Mike said. "I don't remember much of it; those few months were kind of a blur. Eventually, Dad asked what was wrong-"

"Wait," Raina interrupted. "Who's your dad?"

"Scott," Mike answered. "Anyway, he asked what was wrong, and I told him and William. William went to confront Henry about it, and Henry tried to kill him. The robot skeleton- I think its name was Ennard?- decided to leave my body so they could go save William. I don't even know what happened after that, because I didn't have a skeleton and I should have died, but the ghosts said I wouldn't, so I guess I just grew a new skeleton? Honestly, I have no idea. I just know that I'm not a boneless pile of mush and I'm still alive."

"So the sister location was shut down and so was Fredbear's," Charlie continued. "Years later, it was reopened as Freddy Fazbear's, and Jeremy got a job there. I didn't know what happened to my dad or my one remaining brother after that, but Dad showed up again in that restaurant. He disguised himself as an animatronic using an old springlock suit and killed a bunch of kids. He put them in the Toy animatronics, and since he couldn't put a body in the Marionette, he put it in the its box. Eventually, the Toys were carted off and dumped in the old warehouse, and the bodies were never found."

"The restaurant closed again, but it reopened years later," Mike said. "Nobody would take the job on the night shift, so I did. On the fourth night, Henry somehow got into the pizzeria and attacked Dad. William was in a spare room working on the Toy animatronics and was able to get to him in time. William fired me to keep me safe, and he decided to end Freddy's for good by destroying the animatronics."

"Destroying the vessels of the kids' souls was supposed to free them," Charlie explained, "but they were still tied to the restaurant because they wanted revenge on their killer. They saw William, remembered him from their past lives in the pizzeria, and since their memories were jumbled up, they thought he was the killer. It didn't really help that he had just destroyed their vessels, so they got a little confused and tried to attack him."

Mike nodded. "His daughter's soul in the metal skeleton took over and put their body in the old Spring Bonnie suit. She saw an opportunity to get out of William's body and she took it. Scott was packing up the restaurant at the time and he heard the springlocks snap in Parts and Service. He was able to get William out of the suit, but..." He hesitated. "Uh, William's body was too damaged to survive, but the metal skeleton wasn't, and that was where all the souls were anyway, so..." He shrugged. "William survived, but he had to find a new body if he wanted to- well, _look_ normal... and alive."

"So he did," Charlie said with a disgusted grimace, "and he started going by the name Vincent Graves, because to the rest of the world, William Afton was dead. His daughter's soul had moved from Ennard to Springtrap. Eventually, Fazbear's Fright opened. We still have no idea who opened it, but I got the night shift there during college. Mike was there as an assistant manager/security guard. I was there for the same reason Mike was, to see who had opened the attraction and if there was anything that could be done to free the children."

"Everything was going fine until Charlie's last night," Mike said. "Then Henry showed up. We have no idea how he was able to find us, but he knocked me out and put me in one of the springlock suits. I still don't understand why he didn't just stab me or shoot me or something, because that would have been a lot easier, but I'm not complaining. If he had done that, I'd probably be dead. Anyway, he triggered the springlocks, and I almost died."

"Luckily, I was just heading down to the office to resign and pick up my pay cheque," Charlie continued. "I found him and got him out of the suit and to a hospital before he could die. The next day, the attraction burnt down. We don't know how, but we think it was my dad. He died in the fire, but he was able to remain as a ghost. He was a murderer, so he wouldn't be able to leave the places he was connected to until he made up for what he'd done or the kids he killed either got revenge or forgave him."

"And in return, the kids couldn't leave until Henry was gone, so they had to forgive him or get revenge," Mike explained. "They didn't want to forgive him, and they couldn't get revenge, so they were all stuck there."

Charlie sighed. "I moved away, but I heard of the pizzeria being rebuilt. I knew William had something to do with it, so I moved back here." She shrugged. "And that's the end of it."

Fritz furrowed his brow. "But why couldn't you tell us this before?"

"Because Henry was keeping tabs on me, Mike, Scott, and William," Charlie answered. "He didn't want anyone knowing what was really going on, because he liked messing with people." Charlie pursed her lips. "I know he's my dad, but I'm actually kind of glad he's gone."

Everyone was quiet for a moment. Then Raina spoke up. "I have a question," she said quietly.

"What is it?" Mike sat forward.

"Why did you tell us this?"

Mike and Charlie exchanged a glance. "Well," Mike began, "a lot of people thought that William was the killer. Even if we can never let anyone else know, at least we can tell you."

Everyone went quiet. They all looked at each other. They didn't quite know what to do with all of this mind-blowing information. Raina and Jeremy looked surprised, not having known any of this beforehand. Zoe and Fritz had already known some of it, but the part about Charlie's dad and the experiments were extremely unsettling. Mike and Charlie looked upset about having to relive all of it. And Chica-

"Well, that was interesting," Chica suddenly said, standing up and walking towards the door. "Thanks for inviting me. I'm going to head home now. Bye."

Zoe was taken aback. "Um, Chica, don't you want me to drive-"

"No," she interrupted, opening the door. "I'm fine. I can walk." She walked out, closing the door behind her.

Everything was silent for a few moments before Zoe sighed and stood up. "Thank you for inviting us over, you two," she said, looking at Mike and Charlie. "I'm really glad that you decided to share this with the rest of us."

Everyone in the room exchanged a glance, making a silent agreement. No matter what happened, no matter how many years passed, they wouldn't forget Freddy Fazbear's and what happened there.

 ** _xXx_**

Chica scanned the pages of the book in front of her. She knew the others would expect her to be at Zoe's house, but she just didn't want to go there becuse she knew that Zoe and Raina would go there. She didn't want to be around people at the moment. She needed time to think, so she went to the old house she had lived in with the other animatronics.

Hearing Mike and Charlie explain what had happened at Freddy's had just confirmed everything the coloured ghosts had told her and Goldie a while ago. She also remembered a lot of it; being kidnapped by Henry, doctors injecting weird drugs into her arm, seeing Michael's head shoved into Fredbear's mouth, and being killed in the restaurant. This troubled her, definitely, but there was something was troubling her more.

She looked down at her hands. They were still similar to the pale shade they had been before, but after spending time outside in the sun, they were starting to get slightly darker, as was the rest of her. When she tripped and hit her head a few days ago, she looked in a mirror to find a large purple bruise on her forehead. When she got angry or flustered, her face felt hot and turned pink. She had no idea how many different colours normal humans could turn into. But she didn't know why. Why was this happening to her? It shouldn't have been possible, yet here she was.

She sighed and shut her book, leaning back on the couch. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. "What's happening to me?" she whispered to the empty house.

"You're turning into a human, obviously."

Chica screamed and tumbled off the couch. She had asked a question, but she hadn't expected an answer!

She grabbed the edge of the coffee table and pulled herself to her feet, looking around frantically for the source of the voice. The she saw it.

There was a small human-like sillhouette leaning against the wall near the door. It was a dark shade of grey, but as Chica watched, dark wisps of smoke drifted off of it, revealing an eight-year-old girl with short black hair. She had green eyes that shone behind glasses with thick black lenses. She was wearing a green t-shirt and blue jeans, which would have looked nice if not for her bright yellow rubber boots and the dozens of slap bracelets on her arms.

Chica smiled in relief. "Hi Grey. Nice outfit."

Mari laughed. "Well, I'm kind of stuck with it. It's what I died in. I think Raina would approve."

"No kidding," Chica snorted, sitting back down on the couch. "How's the afterlife?"

Mari shrugged. "We're all okay. Teddy, Foxy, and Bonnie are pulling pranks on every ghost they meet. Not very different than they were in life. Tia misses you, by the way. There's no need for food, so she can't really cook much. Mangle and Tonnie seem fine. There's not really anywhere to play hide-and-seek, so they've resorted to tag. Freddy's been complaining about almost everything, so no change there. BB's alright, too. Kinda sad that he can't play with yo-yo anymore."

"What about Goldie and Spring?" Chica asked.

Mari shrugged. "Michael's okay. He made up with Daniel- er, Foxy. Springtrap's really upset. She wanted to see her dad one last time without being possessed and trying to kill him. As for me, I'm pretty okay with the whole 'death' thing. I've been through worse."

Chica nodded. "Yeah." She thought for a moment. "How are you here? Why aren't the others here?"

Mari shrugged. "Dunno. It's always been pretty easy for me to cross the barriers between life and death. I'm not sure why I can do anything that I do. I'm the one who tied your guys' souls to the robots when you died. Of course, I don't know why I just automatically got tied to the Marionette in the first place. Maybe I'm just special," she laughed.

Chica smiled. "Yeah, you are pretty unique."

Mari sighed. "Well, I should go soon. The others will be wondering where I am. I'd suggest you head back, too. Zoe and Raina are going to get worried."

Chica nodded. "Probably."

Mari turned and started walking away. "Well, bye Chica. Maybe I'll see you again sometime."

Chica stood up. "Wait."

Mari stopped and turned back around. "What?"

"What did you mean, I'm turning into a human?" Chica asked.

"Exactly what it sounds like," Mari answered. "You're turning into a human."

"Yeah, but how?"

Mari shrugged. "It's nothing, just a little parting gift."

Chica blinked. "You're doing this?"

Mari nodded. "Yeah. I figured that even if the rest of us couldn't live out the rest of our lives, you might as well. You deserve a second chance." She looked at the door. "Anyway, I should go. I'll tell the others how you're doing, and who knows?" She looked back at Chica and smiled. "Maybe I'll come see you again sometime." She turned and walked through the door.

 ** _xXx_**

It was getting late. Chica had decided to go for a short walk after going back to Zoe's house and changing out of her black dress. She wasn't sure how to feel about walking. Ever since she had started turning more human, it was a lot different than it was when she was a robot. Her legs got tired after a while and her chest started burning. She'd have to get used to it.

It was starting to get cold. She looked up at the sky and saw that the sun was slowly sinking to the horizon. She rubbed her arms. She should have worn a coat. At least her new skin didn't get as cold as her metal used to.

She was about to turn down the street that lead back to Zoe's house when she spotted someone familiar sitting outside at a cafe across the street. She jogged across the crosswalk and stopped in front of him. "Hey Scott."

Scott sipped at his coffee. "Hi Chica. How have you been?"

Chica shrugged. "Pretty good." She was about to say more, but Scott's dog Sparky butted her with his nose. She smiled. "Hey Sparky," she said, reaching down to pet the dog. She was very soft. That was one upside to being human; she could actually feel things other than pain.

She straightened and cleared her throat. "Anyway, Mike and Charlie had a talk with the rest of us. Mike said he invited you, but you didn't show up."

Scott shrugged. "I needed a break."

Chica nodded. "I understand." She gulped, hesitant to ask her next question. "Scott?"

Scott looked up at her, the look on his face telling her that he already knew what she was going to ask. "Yeah?"

"Do you really think he's still alive?"

He didn't answer for a moment. He picked up his coffee and took a long gulp. He se it down and stared at the table, and Chica was started to fear that she'd offended him when he finally sighed and leaned back in his chair. His answer was so quiet that she barely heard him. "Yes."

Chica nodded. She was silent, then she asked, "Are you going to be okay?"

Scott didn't move. He just stared up at the sky, and Chica wasn't even sure if he was breathing. At last, he slowly nodded. "Yes."

"Okay." Chica wrapped her arms around herself. It was starting to get really cold, but she didn't want to leave just yet. She wanted to say something, maybe apologize for what happened, apologize for what she did in her life, apologize for _something_. She opened her mouth, but the words just wouldn't come out.

Scott looked at her and smiled sadly as though he already knew what she was gong to say. She returned the smile. "Are you sure you'll be alright?"

He shrugged. "Yeah. I'll be fine. You should probably get home. It's getting cold out."

"Okay." She turned and started walking down the street. "See you," she called over her shoulder.

"Bye," he said back.

She was just about to turn onto Zoe's street and stopped. She glanced back at Scott. Sparky was running in circles around his feet, seemingly unaware of her owner's troubles. Scott was staring off into the distance, his face hopeful but a little sad, as though waiting for someone who might never come home.

 ** _xXx_**

As soon as Scott and Sparky walked in the door, the Minireenas scrambled out from behind the couch and latched onto the dog. Sparky barked and playfully snapped at the robots. They crawled all over her, trying to avoid her gnashing teeth. The Bidybabs looked up briefly from their spot on the couch where they were playing Monopoly. One of them had stacks of fake money sitting in front of her and the other looked as though she wanted to smash the board with her tiny fists. Bonbon poked his head out from under the couch and waved a tiny paw in greeting.

Scott sat down on the armchair and watched the animatronics play. They had been so much more peaceful after the restaurant burned down. He had never really liked them much the first time he saw them, when William showcased them at Fredbear's. He'd thought they'd looked too creepy to be in a children's restaurant. They still looked creepy now, even more so with the rips in their outer metal and with their endoskeletons exposed, but they were a lot nicer now. They didn't seem to express any interest in killing him yet, so that was good.

He sighed. Even after that short walk, everything hurt. He was starting to get old. He was sixty-eight now. He probably only had about fifteen, maybe twenty years left? Possibly even thirty if he was lucky. He was just hoping William would come back before then. He wasn't happy about it, but he understood why William suddenly left. His brother needed a break. Maybe he'd go on vacation somewhere. Scott snickered. It would be pretty hard to get through airport security with that metal skeleton of his.

Or maybe William wouldn't even come back. They had spent almost an entire lifetime together after all, as brothers and co-workers. Maybe William didn't want to see him anymore. Maybe he wanted to go out and meet new people. Scott's spirits sank as he thought this. He would hate to never see his brother again, but if that's what William wanted, he'd have to deal with it.

Scott leaned forward to grab the TV remote off the coffee table. As he did, he heard a faint knock at the door. He furrowed his brow in confusion. It was almost nine o'clock. Who would come by at this hour?

He walked over and opened the door. Standing on his porch was a young man with light brown skin, purple hair, and striking blue eyes. His mouth stretched into a grin as soon as the door opened.

"Hi Scott."

 ** _GOOD ENDING_**


	52. Epilogue

**Epilogue**

 **June 24, 1960**

William munched on a sandwich as he watched his little brother run around the backyard. Their parents had been invited to dinner by some of the neighbours, so William was responsible for babysitting Scott until they got back. They had just finished moving in a few days ago. William's dad was a historian and researcher, and his work had directed him to America. Just a few months ago, they had been living in Russia. His line of work caused their family to move around a lot, but William's parents had said that the family would be staying where they were, at least until Scott and William graduated and moved out. There was a lot of history in America, and though his parents said that the two of them would be traveling around the country on their own sometimes, William and Scott would be able to stay in one place. William was fifteen, just old enough for his parents to consider him responsible enough to look after Scott for a while. Scott didn't even need to be taken care of though. Scott was eleven, and though he sometimes acted as if he were a child, he was quite responsible himself.

"Hey, William!"

William turned to see Henry running into the backyard. William hadn't known Henry for very long, and had only met him two days ago in school, but he was William's only friend so far. Henry was a bit of a smart-ass. He always seemed to have a sarcastic remark on the tip of his tongue. He had seemed annoying and obnoxious when William first saw him in school, but then he got to know him a little better, and now the two of them were friends. William was quite shy and would prefer staying indoors and reading to going out and talking to people, and Henry was loud and enthusiastic, so it was a miracle that the two had gotten along so quickly.

Henry slowed down his pace and sat on the porch next to William, a little out of breath. He ran almost everywhere; in stores, in his house, and in school, which had gotten him in trouble quite a few times.

"Hey," Henry said again. "How's babysitting going?"

William shrugged in response. "Not that bad. He's been out here for the past half-hour, spinning until he gets dizzy. He already had dinner, so I just need to make sure he doesn't leave the yard or accidentally hurt himself." He glanced sideways at his friend. "How's your day going?"

Henry shrugged. "Meh. My parents are making me get a job."

"What kind of job?"

"I was just thinking of getting a part-time one at that restaurant down the street," Henry answered. "I'd probably just be a waiter or something."

William grinned. "I've always wanted to work at a restaurant."

Henry raised an eyebrow. "Really?"

William nodded. "Yeah."

"I thought you'd want to be a mechanic."

William shrugged. "I don't know. I wish I could be both."

"Well, why don't you?"

William furrowed his brow. "What do you mean?"

Henry pivoted so he was sitting cross-legged on the porch facing William. "Make a restaurant and make it car-themed or something."

William scoffed. "Nah, that'd be dumb. What would I do, put a car in the middle of the restaurant and dismantle the engine for entertainment?"

"Yeah, maybe not the best idea," Henry replied. "But how else could you combine the two?"

William thought for a moment. He stared out at the yard, watching his little brother play. He saw an unpacked box of Scott's old toys sitting at the bottom of the steps to the porch. Scott had told their parents that he didn't even play with them anymore and that they could sell them, but their parents had insisted that they pack them "just in case". There was an old purple teddy bear poking out of the box, staring at the ground with blank eyes, and an idea sparked in William's mind.

"This is going to sound stupid."

Henry leaned forward eagerly. "What is it?"

"I could make a restaurant for kids," William began, "and make some animal-ish robots to be entertainment. I know, it's a dumb idea, but it's just a thought."

Henry blinked. "That's... That's actually a pretty good idea."

William raised his eyebrows. "Really?"

Henry nodded. "Yeah. It's unique, and kids love animals so it would bring in a lot of money. You'd just have to sell fast food so people keep coming back."

William sighed. "Why are we even talking about this? We've still got three years to figure out what we want to do after we graduate. Besides, I know nothing about running a business."

Henry grinned. "Well, I was planning on taking some business courses next year..."

William raised an eyebrow. "And?"

"Hypothetically, if we actually _did_ do this, I could deal with all the business stuff and you could focus on the robots and all that."

William blinked. "Wait, do you actually want to do this?"

Henry shrugged. "I don't know. It's an okay idea. I think it would be fun."

William smiled. "Yeah, it would be pretty fun. But we've still got a few years left to decide what to do with our lives. Let's just keep it as a future possibility."

Henry nodded. "Okay. But if we did do it, what would we call the restaurant? Brooks and Afton's Super-Cool Fast Food Restaurant?"

William smirked. "I think you mean Afton and Brooks's. I'm the smarter one, so my name should come first."

Henry shook his head. "Nope. My last name ends with an 's' so if you make it possessive, it sounds like you're saying 'Brookses'. Also, you're getting it wrong. It's not the name of the smarter one that should come first, it's the name of the more good-looking one that comes first."

"So, my name would be first either way then," William quipped.

Henry playfully nudged William with his elbow. "Oh, shut up. You're just jealous that I'm so hot."

"That one girl you dated last year told me otherwise."

"At least I've dated someone. You wouldn't be able to get a date with a bear."

"Maybe in England I wouldn't, but here, I've got an accent. Everyone loves it. Three people have already asked me to the school dance next Friday and I didn't even know any of their names."

"Lucky," Henry sighed. He glanced at his watch. "I should probably get going soon. My parents recently gave me a curfew, and they said they'll ground me if I break it one more time."

"That sucks."

"Yeah." He looked back at William. "You want to walk me home?"

William rolled his eyes, but he was smiling. "'Walk'? With you, it'll turn into a full-out sprint."

Henry shrugged. "I can't help it. I have a lot of energy."

William sighed. "I'd love to, but I still have to watch Scott until my parents get home."

"I can stay here and help you look after him," Henry offered. "I'm sure my parents won't mind if I'm late if I was helping you babysit."

"You're probably going to get in trouble," William reminded him.

"I don't mind," Henry said. "I just don't want to be alone in the house with my parents. I love them and all, but they're really annoying sometimes. And they wonder why I stay out late all the time."

"Okay, stay here if you want. It's not me who's going to get grounded."

Henry smiled. "Thanks."

The two of them sat back and stared out at the backyard. Henry did his best to put the idea of the restaurant out of his mind, but he couldn't help but wonder what it would be like if they actually did this in the future. William was also thinking about the restaurant, but more than anything, he was just glad that his family would be staying here for a while. And whatever future that he might have, restaurant or not, he was sure that it would be amazing, as long as Henry was there with him.


	53. Author's Note

**Well, there it is.**

 **I'm kind of glad that I finished this story when I did, because my parents are probably going to make me get a job sometime this summer and they're going to make me go outside more often, which is going to take up more of time, so I wouldn't be able to write as much.**

 **I never really expected so many people to actually enjoy this story. Like? 138 reviews? 63 favourites? 72 followers? what the actual fuck?**

 **In all seriousness though, I had a lot of fun writing this story (no matter how cringey it may have been to read) and I'm glad that so many of you actually stuck around to read the whole thing. Here's one big-ass shout out to all of you.**

 **Unfortunately, now that this is done, it's probably the last story that I'll do on . But! That doesn't mean that I'm going to stop writing. I have a Wattpad account as well as an Instagram and a tumblr, so if you want to see me complain about life and post memes, go right ahead and follow them (even thouh I don't use my tumblr at all and I haven't started using my Wattpad yet). My username for all three is vincentbluerose (with periods between the words; the website keeps deleting it when I put in the periods for some reason). Speaking of which, I decided what to change my name to (it's Vincent, if you didn't figure that out). I'd actually been considering that as a name for a few years now, but I never mentioned it in any of my ANs because it's a FNaF fanfiction and I didn't want anyone to think I was naming myself after the fan name for the purple guy (even though it's not even an official name and I actually first got it from Vincent Van Gogh), but I think you lovely people deserve to know.**

 **Anyway, thanks for reading this extremely cringey fanfiction, and if you decide to find me on Instagram, you can let me know who you are (or you can just find me and stare at my account in awkward silence while debating whether or not to say anything and then wimping out and leaving it alone which is basically what i would do tbh).**

 **Thanks for reading!**


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